Funnel Magazine Volume 3: Edition 1

FUNNEL MAGAZINE TRAFFIC & LEAD GEN

EXCLUSIVE CONTENT

CUSTOMER SERVICE IS A BIG PART OF YOUR FUNNEL TURNING INTO A

6 FUNNELS

THE INTERVIEW

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FLYWHEEL

METRICS

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16 STRATEGY & TACTICS

LEADERSHIP

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78 SOCIAL MEDIA

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LETTER

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UNDERSTANDING THE MARKETING LIFECYCLE

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FROM THE EDITOR

KAELIN AND BRADON POULIN GROW PAST THE LAPTOP LIFESTYLE

HACK MY 60 SECONDS VIDEO LEAD MAGNET TEMPLATE

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CUSTOMER SERVICE A BIG PART OF YOUR FUNNEL FLYWHEEL

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RUSSELL’S FUNNEL-HACKING COMMANDMENTS

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SPLIT TESTING-3 WAYS TO OPTIMIZE YOUR CLICKFUNNELS FUNNEL PSYCHOLOGY OF SOCIAL SELLING

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BECOME A THOUGHT LEADER IN YOUR INDUSTRY, TODAY

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STRATEGIC PARTNERSHIPS CAN BENEFIT YOUR BUSINESS

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LETTER FROM THE EDITOR OF

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Dear Funnel Hackers, We have a Mind and Body Building Edition to share with you, featuring power couple: Kaelin and Brandon Poulin, the founders, and creators of Lady Boss, not only have they created an absolutely incredible community that started from them walking on the treadmill at Planet Fitness. They are also helping women all around the world lose weight and love themselves. Their uplifting interview with Hawk is complete with Gold Nuggets of game-changing tips that you can put in place today to have a better business and a healthy lifestyle! Kaelin holds the world record in the International Federation of Bodybuilding. They are here sharing their superpower with us everything from battling massive lack of execution and focus to putting your customer first.

I hope each and every one of our readers take as much out of this edition as I did. Being the wife of a husband and wife team in this digital marketing world, the game changers Kaelin and Brandon shared just completely blew me away!

I stopped working on, what I was doing and even though Joe was sitting right next to me I messaged him their whole morning alignment routine that they shared in the interview. Brandon says in the interview “So whether you’re married or not, you do it with yourself if you’re not. If you have a business partner, you do it with your business partner. If you’re married, you do it with your spouse.

If you don’t, you just do it alone. But getting in alignment is number one.”

Whether if you’re interested in tapping into becoming your own lady boss and joining their community or just if you want to follow the advice of this power couple that has built a 32 million dollar a year company in just four years.

Your Breakthrough Awaits!

Your Editor Tricia Wilkes

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Understanding The Marketing Lifecycle ARTICLE BY Andrew Wallis

The Marketing Lifecycle is a SYSTEM that defines The key to knowing your goals and take all of the “stuff” how to ensure you’re sending the right message, to the you’re doing for follow up, for conversation, for lead generation… and channel that activity energy into a right person, at the right time.

SYSTEM. It will be the foundation of your marketing.

It’s important to have a marketing SYSTEM for your Let’s start with a question… business that consistently attracts the right qualified prospects to you, and then supports converting them Do you enjoy marketing or does it stress you out? into lifetime clients or customers.

For some people, marketing causes them frustration, angst, and they would rather push it to the back burner. It’s NOT about which marketing campaign to run.

They’d rather focus on working in an area of their When it comes to marketing, a lot of people are just business where they’re confident and comfortable. looking for the “magic bullet” that will allow them to If that sounds like you, don’t worry. This article is here to immediately get more clients or customers help you turn that around.

Well, I’ve got news for you… there is no one way to get Working on marketing can feel like there’s an endless you more clients. What works for one person, may not amount of activity to do because, frankly, there could work for another. be!

I want you to understand the strategy behind successful There’s always “more to do” when it marketing, and how to own and drive the SYSTEM that produces the results you need when you need them. comes to marketing activity.

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The purpose of this article today is to empower you to control your destiny and not be limited in your thinking

about just getting short-term wins.

have from doing business with you.

Let’s jump in.

Now let’s expand on each of these different phases to make sure you fully understand what they can do for you.

An Introduction of the Marketing Lifecycle

As you will see in the list below, there are nine phases of Phase 1: Attracting Traffic the Lifecycle. Let’s go through them briefly one by one: The world needs to know who you are and what you 1. Target Market – as you might have guessed its do. extremely important to be clear on who are the ideal clients or customers for your business. Some people call If you’re hidden and nobody knows who you are or how them your Client Avatar, others your Buyers Persona. If to do business with you, they’re not going to find you you are not absolutely clear on who your target client(s) magically. are, then I suggest you block some time to work on this You have to give them a reason to visit your website, as I can’t stress how important it is to get this right. check out your social media channels, and call or 2. Attract Interest – is all about attracting people to e-mail for more information. either go to your website and fill out a form, pick up the phone and call you, or to just walk in to your place The goal here is to generate awareness of you and of business and say, “Tell me more about how you can your business through the delivery of educational, informative and engaging content that delivers on help me. How do I sign up? What do you do?” value and helps to display your expertise.

That’s where it all begins. That’s all part of the front-end Phase 2: Capturing Leads process I call “top of funnel” to get things moving.

3. Collect Leads – refers to capturing prospect’s contact It’s not enough to just have people visit your website information and adding them to your database so you and then leave. can communicate with them consistently over time.

That’s of no value to you or to the prospective customer.

4. Educate – nurturing is about developing a deeper When they’re on your website, you want to capture their relationship and engaging with a prospect so that when details so you can continue the conversation through they’re ready to do business, they do business with you your emails. and not someone else.

You need to give them a good reason to give you their 5. Offer – this is where you take friends, fans and “likes” contact details. You want a system to capture those and turn them into paying clients and customers that details and follow up with them. do business with you.

That’s when you move into “The Nurturing Phase”…

6. Close – making the sale

Phase 3: Nurturing Prospects

7. Deliver and WOW – take great care of the clients Just like we water plants to help them grow, we invest time and customers who trust their business with you. Deliver in communicating with people to grow relationships. more value than people expect and make them feel What do you do? good about doing business with you.

8. Offer More – (also referred to as cross-selling) refers The leads that are hot to solve a problem now or get to additional sales that are made to a client after on and attack a goal, should be immediately engaged their initial purchase with you. When you do a great so you can convert them into clients and customers. You job and over deliver, clients see you as their advocate want to engage them in your sales process. and value the support you give them. You’ll then have the opportunity to help them solve other problems and achieve more goals. This often includes professional recommendations for additional product and service offerings that are supportive.

9. Get Referrals – if you do a great job, your customers will want to have the people they care about, their friends and family, experience the same benefits they

For the remaining leads, you want to nurture them over time so that when they’re ready to buy, they come to you and not someone else.

Let’s go over some statistics to show you why this stage is so important.

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81% of sales happen after seven or more contacts.

was listening to her wants.

Read that again. Seven or more contacts!

18 months later she reconnected with me having lost a lot of weight and had found a lot more confidence.

The facts are that 85% of the time, most business She was a client for 4 years (until I moved away) and owners stop connecting after one or two contacts! referred 5 more people to me.

I remember coaching a client a few years ago who The point of this story is to reinforce the fact that you invested significant time promoting and running a have to nurture and invest in that relationship and give workshop. They delivered great value and had a good value early on to be successful. But it can take time. number of people turn up.

This is VERY important, and one of the best tools I They followed my instructions and had the attendees recommend you invest in if you haven’t already is a fill out their contact details so that they could receive CRM platform such as Active Campaign, Convertkit, the tools and handouts from the workshop. A few weeks Drip or Infusionsoft. These tools are all geared up to later they were complaining that they needed more help you automate your marketing. leads and our conversation went back to the leads they generated at the workshop.

I’m not going to go into great depth in this in this article.

When it comes to nurturing, you can set a great process I asked them how many had signed up and it transpired in place for what I call indoctrination. that this person had not followed up or sent anything to them. When he got home he simply stuffed the forms in It’s all about getting people to know you, like you, trust a drawer and forgot about them!! you enough to make them want to move forward in the next step in learning about you, speaking with you Don’t be that person! face-to-face and coming in for a sales consult, etc.

Essentially you just wasted your whole marketing activity Here’s an example… or effort because you didn’t nurture the relationship.

When people fill out your web form, they get plugged Just because they didn’t want to get married today into a sequence which consists of automated emails doesn’t mean they’re not a candidate to date and do and follow up phone calls so you can follow up with business with down the road. them, communicate with them, and convert them over It’s very important that you have a structured follow-up time. and nurture process. This is one key area I work with Phase 4: Converting Sales clients on.

This is where the magic happens, where you take all the I want to impress upon you that most sales happen work you did to attract traffic, capture leads, nurture after some time has passed. I remember when I was a them, and now finally you get the opportunity to personal trainer I was taking a prospect through a sales engage them in your sales process to convert a prospect consultation. into a customer.

Because of the answers, she had given me, I could tell Phase 5: Deliver and Satisfy she wasn’t ready to commit. She was clinically obese and needed to take urgent action for the sake of her Here is a formula I was taught a few years ago for health. Her husband and her mother had arranged delivering value… for her to chat with me but it was clear that she wasn’t CE + R + R = V ready.

Client Experience + Relationship + Results = VALUE She wanted to do it for them but not for her. I told her that I would not be taking her on as a client at that time Value is the sum of the experience that people have because I wanted her to want it. I gave her some things in doing business with you (in everything from visiting to do at home and a meal plan for her to follow and a you at your place of business, calling you on the phone, subscription to my email newsletter. She burst into communicating with you in different channels, e-mail, tears because she felt that at last someone etc.) to the relationships they build with you, with your staff, with the other clients of the business and the results they get.

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Investing and then proving every one of those, the

Client Experience, the Relationship, and the Results will That’s the first stage and until I generate some good deliver more value to your clients and customers. That’s amounts of traffic nothing else matters?” the key.

Actually, that’s wrong.

The more value you deliver, the more valuable you Good marketing starts with well-defined sales targets. become, the more you can charge, and the more indispensable you are in their lives because you Before you start engaging a marketing activity, you become a critical part of their life. have to know the results you want to produce. You need to have a target that you’re going to focus on and go They’re not just getting a great service from you, they hit. have made friends with other staff and clients, and when they become bonded to you.. they feel like an That means getting really clear about the number of important part of your community. leads that you need in your pipeline and nailing down a number of qualified consults you need to hit your Think about the products or services you deliver. How sales targets and goals. are you working with people? How are you delivering the results they seek? The community you create and Know your targets. the relationships you build are ALL part of delivering Let me give you an example here… and satisfying.

When you crush that, when you have a great product, Let’s start with a sales goal of eight new clients and your a great experience and service for the people you serve, close rate is let’s say, at 80% with your sales process. your business is going to prosper and be successful for a You want to determine how many qualified consults you need. long time to come.

You know the sales goal, eight clients, times 100, divided by the close rate of 80% equals the number Upselling (or cross-selling) customers is really where you of qualified consults – so you need 10 qualified leads get the opportunity to help them more. to get the eight new clients that you want to hit for the business to be successful and hit the client target goal If they came in to solve a problem, you’ve delivered we have for the month with your sales process. tremendous value in that experience, they love you and they want more, you created what’s called hyper- The value of marketing is really to support your sales responsive clients. process.

Phase 6: Upsell

They’re open to following your professional recommendations regarding other products or additional services that you may recommend that compliment or enhance their original purchase.

Phase 7: Get Referrals

You have to connect those two together, and get really clear on the outcome and the number you need to achieve so that you can focus and hone in your strategy and your creative pieces (i.e. your marketing materials) to make sure you’re hitting that number.

So there you have it, an overview of the Marketing The same hyper-responsive clients will also be an Lifecycle. I hope you have found this useful. incredible source of referrals.

Referrals can come from current clients or customers, former customers, unconverted prospects, and partners.

Referrals can come from all sources but you will want to grow your business from the inside out and grow the referral network that you have. You do that in this stage.

Where to Start on your Marketing Lifecycle (it’s not what you think) Now that you understand all of the phases of the Marketing Lifecycle, it’s time to start making progress with your marketing.

You might think, “Great. This all starts with traffic, right?

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Hack My 60 Seconds Video Lead Magnet Template ARTICLE BY Charly Wigstrom

Copy and Paste my 4-part template that makes it easy Start with an eye opener. Your first sentence is your bait. to create effective, Hugely engaging video ads whether It needs to grab people’s attention and make them you’re a video pro or a complete rockie. want more. Something like: Bait (0:00 to 0:03)

• When I was 41, my wife leave home.

• When I was 25, I went to SeaWorld and got This is the most important part of your video because attacked by a seagull. it’s where most video traffic is lost. (Facebook doesn’t even call it a view if a viewer doesn’t watch it for at least To find your best stories, think about the things that 3 seconds!) have happened to you, especially life-changing or So, forget everything you thought you knew about defining moments in your life. videos. Here are the rules for capturing your viewers You can use a different story in each video, but it needs right now. to relate to the offer you’re making in that video.

Get off the bumper section. A bumper is an intro with The Structure your logo and background music. It’s all about you, and it doesn’t engage your viewers, so don’t include it. • Open with the phrase, “When I was…”

• Then immediately follow it with a summary of Instead, get right to the point. Start with movement. what happened.Your story should be about 3 Shake your hands, Funny faces, Colourful clothes. seconds long: short and sweet!.

Anything to make people stop scrolling and watch.

Don’t include an intro. The average video starts with Ignite Pain/Pleasure (0:03 to 0:15) the speaker introducing themselves and giving their In this part, we focus on the problem you’ll solve for credentials. Something like: your potential customers.

• Hi, my name is Charly. I’m 42. I went to How? Harvard and now I make videos.Sorry, but no one cares about your bio. Do this instead…

• Open with the point of the story: what you learned or how it impacted you.

• Transition to the problem.

• State the problem clearly.

• Agitate. Let them know you understand their pain.

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• My name is [name].

• I do [what your service or business is].

Example: • I’d be very happy to [name the help you’ll give or action you want].

At 25 years old, I learned that things don’t always go like you plan. And a lot of you might feel that way when Putting It All Together it comes to lead generation and traffic.

This section should take no more than 12 seconds.

You’re running ad campaigns on Facebook, Google, Once you have all 4 components written out, put them and other channels. And though you hear a lot of together to create your video script. success stories, you feel like your ads aren’t working very Hook well.

When I was 35, i was standing in the middle of nowhere What you’re realizing is that there’s a lot of competition in a Oil & Gas Platform on these platforms, and it’s harder than it looks to do things the right way.

My Friends and I were headed to the Helideck when weather become Horrible. And unfortunately, we didn’t Describe Solution (0:15 to 0:50) make it to the Helideck, and I learned the hard way If you’re creating a sales video, this will be the core of about the importance of a weather Forecast before a your content. The goal here is to show a picture of the planning to go back Home after you complete your solution—life without the problem you’ve been talking shift. about—and how you make it happen.

Ignite Pain There’s no unique structure for this section, but you may I also learned that things don’t always go like you plan. follow this simple format: And a lot of you might feel that way when it comes to marketing.

• Explain what your solution is.

• Explain how or why it works.

You’re running ad campaigns on Facebook, Google, • Describe how it will change their lives. and other channels. And though you hear a lot of success stories, you feel like your ads aren’t working very Take about 35 seconds to describe the solution you well. offer.

What you’re realizing is that there’s a lot of competition Call to Action (0:50 to 0:60) on these platforms, and it’s harder than it looks to do In the last few seconds of your video, tell people what to things the right way. do next with a simple call to action (CTA).

Describe Solution Keep in mind, the CTA doesn’t have to involve selling I’ve spent over $1 million on Facebook, and I’m very something. familiar with the platform.

Typical Hard CTAs Call to Action • Click below.

My name is Logan and I do Facebook ads. I’d be very • Enter below. happy to help you regain control of your Facebook ads.

Once your script has been plugged into the grid, Possible Soft CTAs read through it to make sure it flows.

• I’m looking forward to connecting.

• Fix anything that stops the flow.

• I’ll send you more content.

• Add transitions where necessary.

• Make sure stays at or near 60 seconds.

My Favorite CTA Since we cut our introduction and bio from the beginning of the video, it makes sense to include it here. Here’s how I usually do it:

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Article by Josh Jurkovich

Customer Service is a Big Part of your Funnel Turning into a Flywheel

We are seeing a dramatic shift from funnel marketing on why customer service and happy customers are the to flywheel marketing. But, for many marketers, the biggest parts of your funnel turning into a flywheel. funnel is a trusted sidekick, making it difficult to kick it Important Customer Service Statistics (1) to the side.

• More than half of consumers in America have Conversion charts are typically depicted in a funnel ditched a plan to buy a product because of poor format. What goes in at the top flows to the bottom customer service. and goes out. Much of the time, though, leads that • 51% of consumers will switch to a different come in at the top don’t make it to the bottom. Instead, company once they experience poor customer they jump ship before making an actual purchase. service.

A lot of energy goes into moving leads from the top to • 95% of consumers are apt to tell their friends the bottom of the funnel, but what happens after they about poor customer service. Only 11% are apt make a purchase and exit the bottom? Where does all to tell them about good customer service. that energy go? Did you know it’s 9x easier to get a • $62B are lost each year by American companies customer to buy from you again than it is to gain a new due to poor customer service. customer?

• 70% of consumers will pay more money for a product if it comes with superior customer With funnel marketing, you lose the energy you invested service. into a customer after they exit the funnel, regardless if • Increasing customer retention by 5% can they made a purchase or not. With flywheel marketing, increase your profits by as much as 95%. the energy is restored, repurposed, and released • It takes 5 to 25 times more money to capture a to expand brand awareness. It focuses on the entire new customer than to keep an existing one. customer journey. Each spoke on the flywheel adds to • American consumers will spend up to 17% more the momentum of your marketing efforts. on a product if it is accompanied by a good customer experience.

Let’s explore why it’s time for your brand to hop aboard the flywheel marketing wagon.

More importantly, let’s laser-focus What’s Wrong With Funnel Marketing?

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Funnel marketing focuses too much on the conversion. It doesn’t take into account what happens to the customer

after they are converted. More so, it doesn’t use your your customers are going to abandon the transaction existing customers as a part of a brand awareness if they can’t find quick and helpful answers during the checkout process. strategy.

HubSpot is known for being one of the world’s most successful content management and search engine optimization platforms. In fact, it’s brand name has become synonymous with inbound marketing. When this marketing giant recommends a certain marketing approach, it’s because it’s been endlessly tested and proven itself to be tried and true.

A funnel marketing strategy doesn’t focus on customer advocacy near as much as flywheel marketing. With the latter, your marketing strategies delve deep into creating an appealing onboarding experience for the new customer. They begin the onboarding process with reviews and recommendations from existing customers to showcase why the product is worth purchasing.

John Dick with HubSpot says, “Funnels produce Your existing customers who have had a happy customers, but don’t consider how those customers experience are your greatest asset; they market your can help you grow. And all the momentum you built brand for you to the new customer. acquiring that customer? Gone. Each day, each month, What Does Flywheel Marketing Look Like? and each quarter, we have to start new.”

An effective flywheel marketing approach is going to Not only is the funnel inefficient, but it also causes you to ignore your existing client base. All of your energy is focused on acquiring new customers rather than retaining the ones you have. And once that new customer converts into a sale, all of the invested energy is lost.

Flywheel marketing upholds the momentum of your invested energy, and any additional energy that you add causes the flywheel to spin faster. Your marketing efforts are multiplied instead of coming to a halt.

Customer Reviews and Word-of-Mouth Marketing are at the Core of Flywheel Marketing The internet is making it simple to be the ultimate informed consumer. Louder than any other marketing method is your customer’s voice.

Consumers are performing research to obtain a clear view of how businesses treat their customers. They are heavily relying on word-of-mouth recommendations and online reviews to fuel their purchasing decisions. As a result, the power to convert a customer now falls into the hands of your existing customers rather than your own.

have a central focus: outstanding customer service.

Only 3% of consumers view marketers as being trustworthy. Instead, they put their trust in online reviews and word-of-mouth recommendations. This means your current customers who have a good customer experience are your most valuable asset. They have the potential to present your brand as being trustworthy.

Customers have higher expectations than they’ve ever had. They demand effective products accompanied “Once your flywheel is spinning, momentum comes by a superior purchasing experience and exceptional from retaining customers and transforming them into promoters who will advocate for your brand customer service. and even bring you new business.” (2) Gone are the days of consumers turning to blog posts and landing pages of brands highlighting their own By 2020, your brand’s customer experience is going products. Consumers want reviews from people who to have more weight in converting customers have actually used your product. They want instant than the price or access to communication with your company to have all of their questions answered, thus being a reason customer service chat features are so important. 45% of EDITION 1

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usefulness of your product. It has quickly become the from one brand to the next. avenue to positive brand differentiation.

When creating your flywheel ecosystem, you need to Amazon has done an extremely good job at using outline your initiatives; these are going to represent your flywheel marketing to create the ultimate customer spokes. For example, one spoke should focus on thought experience. For consumers, Amazon’s approach to leadership, which will involve publishing blog posts, customer service has now become their preferred white papers, case studies, executive commentaries, standard. From overnight shipping to intricate etc. Another spoke will focus on demand generation; algorithms that basically read the minds of consumers, this is where you’ll create email campaigns, direct mail brands are finding it difficult to maintain a competitive strategies, account-based marketing tactics, etc. edge. After all, it takes millions of dollars to deliver a You can create as many spokes as you like for each customer experience that comes even close to what flywheel, but to keep things simple and to make it Amazon provides. easier to measure each flywheel’s conversion rate, you’ll probably want to have a maximum of three to five spokes.

Most brands don’t have millions to invest in marketing but delivering a positive customer experience is still possible.

Each spoke on the flywheel marketing approach must center around the customer experience. When customers have a good customer experience, this turns them into happy customers. Instead of tackling marketing as a linear process, you integrate tactics in a circular motion. The more energy you add to one spoke, the faster the whole wheel spins.

Ideally, you will invest most of your energy on the spokes that have the most potential to increase revenue. For a lot of businesses, increasing revenue is focused solely on acquiring new customers. They forget about turning their existing customers into repeat customers. They forget about enhancing the customer experience, which should always involve following up with customers who have already made a purchase.

No matter the spoke you’re focusing on, you must ask yourself, “how does this translate into a good customer experience?” Let’s say you’re creating a blog post on 5 Reasons to Buy Accounting Software. You must position the topic in a way that it leaves the reader not only considering making a purchase, but that informs the reader of how it has helped other customers.

Customer testimonials and case studies are going to produce much greater leverage than a blog post talking about your specific product. The goal is to explain why a certain type of product is going to meet their needs, and then allow your case studies and customer testimonials to highlight why your product is the best one.

Your flywheel is going to look different from the flywheels of other brands. Why? Because no two brands are the same. For every marketing funnel that you have, you’ll need to create a new flywheel. Your overarching flywheel is going to have mini flywheels that all interconnect with one another. Still yet, at the center of each flywheel is the customer experience. That is one aspect of the The power of customer testimonials is enormous. (3) flywheel that remains the same • 95% of consumers will read an online review before making a purchase.

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purchases off trusted reviews.

• Publishing reviews on your site can increase your brand’s conversion rate by as much as 270%.

To get positive reviews, you must master good customer service. This is precisely why your flywheels need to focus on the customer experience more than anything else.

its core activity. This publishing practice needs to be deployed in a manner so that it moves the customer into the next stage of the buyer’s journey.

Next, determine how you can better meet these KPIs through word-of-mouth recommendations and online reviews. It all comes back to providing quality customer service. The better the customer experience, the easier it becomes to achieve KPIs.

you are along for the ride whether or not the customer makes a purchase. That you are willing to do whatever it takes to empower your audience to reach their goals. You follow up with customers who have made a purchase and make sure they are satisfied not only with the product but pleased with your brand as well. This is a part of the flywheel that involves sending out Net Promoter Score surveys to gather valuable insight on how well you were able to meet your customers’ needs.

It also involves asking customers to leave reviews and testimonials.

For example, a blog post showcasing your thought leadership should include a CTA that invites the reader to check out a product (your product) that is being discussed in the content. But remember, the content Turning Your Funnel Into a Flywheel in the blog shouldn’t focus solely on your product. It You still need funnel outlines to succeed in flywheel focuses on a type of product that can meet the reader’s marketing. need. Not until they click on the CTA do they discover The buyer’s journey is a multi-layered process that your product as being the exact type of product they stems from an introduction and then (hopefully) turns need. into a conversion. You can’t provide good customer Your overarching flywheel will have the customer at the service without pinpointing the process the customer is center and three spokes surrounding it: attract, engage, going through; this is why you still need funnel outlines. delight.

Without them, it becomes difficult to create your You attract through content marketing. This is going flywheels. to include blog postings, video tutorials, customer The purpose of creating the flywheels is to make testimonials, case studies, etc. You engage by building sure each part of the funnel feeds off one another. relationships with customers. You interact with them to More importantly, to ensure once the conversion has understand their needs and to show them you are truly taken place, that the energy invested in acquiring the concerned with meeting those needs. If you don’t think customer can be used to drive new customers into the your product can meet their exact needs, you direct beginning phase of the buyer’s journey. them to a brand that can. You familiarize yourself with Once you have developed your funnels, it then the roadblocks that your customers encounter and becomes time to turn them into flywheels. First, you’ll continue publishing content that outlines how you can start by identifying your marketing key performance help them overcome these obstacles. indicators (KPIs). You’ll need a good understanding of The last part of the flywheel is all about delighting the inbound marketing to create and measure KPIs. customer with optimal customer service. You prove that

To enhance customer service, you must spot areas of friction in the marketing flywheel that hinder a good customer experience. Are your customers constantly having to be transferred to different departments to get their inquiries addressed? Can your customers easily identify your customer service phone number without having to click on numerous pages? Does the When customers leave their feedback, this creates a funnel require a customer to speak with more than one gold mine of content to center the Attract spoke around.

You can turn the testimonials into videos, case studies, employee to make a purchase? blog postings, and more.

“Often, friction exists because two teams are movEach spoke on the flywheel keeps the entire marketing ing in opposite directions. For example, marketing is traditionally goaled on an overall lead generation approach spinning in motion. As customers exit what would have been the bottom of the number -- but optimizing for lead quantity doesn’t funnel, the energy and monies you always lead to good-fit customers.” (4) have invested in them don’t go After addressing friction, you’ll need to look at the core activities attached to each spoke on the flywheel. Your thought leadership will have publishing content as EDITION 1

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to waste.

You’ll also need to create a customer expansion strategy that follows up with customers and helps them get the most out of your product rather than leaving them hanging after they make a purchase.

To address friction that impedes the flywheel from gaining momentum, ask yourself:

In the traditional funnel, customers who jump ship before making a purchase don’t add any value to the rest of the funnel. With flywheel marketing, customers who jump ship still contribute to the momentum of the spinning wheel.

Key Aspects to Remember When Creating a Flywheel For new businesses, the majority of resources will be allocated to the Attract and Engage spokes on the flywheel. You have to get these spokes turning before you can close on deals. Once the flywheel is in motion, though, you can then start focusing more on the Delight spoke. The goal is to retain your existing customers and convert them into promoters of your brand.

• What is causing friction? Are customers wanting to try a free demo of your product without having to talk to a salesperson?

• Can anything be automated to eliminate this friction? Are automated follow-up emails being sent to customers 7 days after making a purchase or trying a demo?

• How can team reorganization minimize friction? Do customers have to speak to multiple sales teams if they purchase more than one product?

89% of customers become extremely aggravated and endure a poor customer experience when they have to repeat the same information to more than one representative. Does your marketing funnel address this issue? With the flywheel strategy, team reorganization ensures the customer can receive quick and correct answers. Instead of siloing your teams, all teams work together and are well-versed in all departments.

The Takeaway

Flywheel marketing nurtures the customer relationship by providing outstanding customer service no matter where the customer is at in the buyer’s journey. Certain spokes of the flywheel may receive a higher number of resources and a larger portion of your attention, but at the center of the flywheel is the customer experience.

This ensures no matter the spoke being focused on, An excellent example of restrategizing your funnel into customer service beats as the heart of your entire a flywheel is to change the goals of your marketing marketing strategy. team. Instead of focusing solely on the acquisition, If you would like to learn more about how you can turn the marketing team splits its focus on acquiring new your funnel into a flywheel, please connect with me on customers AND retaining the ones you have. your favorite social media or connect with me directly “Some of your biggest friction points can be at www.joshj360.com. smoothed by re-setting goals or introducing proTo your success! cesses that re-orient teams in the same direction.” (5) The traditional conversion path needs to change from having prospects fill out lead generation forms to allowing them to connect you with via chat, by phone, email, OR filling out a lead generation form.

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Article by Charly Wigstrom

Russell’s Funnel-Hacking Commandments

How Russell’s Funnel-Hacking Commandments Help me to Unlock $6287,40 in 27 days on Builderall Business using the Epic 30days Funnel What I’ve called the Romeo and Juliet Technic {Discover the Epic30days Funnel} When you are building a funnel, Russell has said it many times in his training… Pioneers get arrows in their backs. Find a market that has successful products in it then find your own position in that market.

see similar results within your own business. While this won’t happen immediately, you’ll begin to see trends in what’s working and what’s not a lot faster than testing floating ideas from scratch.

The Most Simple and Profitable Funnel in my whole “LIFE”.....epic30days.com

If you’re a marketer who’s growing your business by building landing pages and sales funnels in your niche, you’ll agree that being able to ‘funnel hack’ is a vital skill.

Wait. Did I hear you ask…. what ‘Funnel Hacking’ means?

Funnel Hacking [verb] – “to funnel hack”

How Does Everything start?

The process of strategically investigating the sales and marketing process of your competitors, which you can use to model and test within your own sales & marketing processes. By taking advantage of the culture of hacking a Funnel and getting into the thick of your competitor’s processes, you can really see how successful they have been, and start to

Covering the “5 Winning Pieces” (Research-Lead Magnet-Ads-Funnel and Sales) of Digital marketing we went in our Process performing the following tasks

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Research about our Dream Customer and its Pain points!

The Majority of my Clients and Students trying to perform some sort of affiliate sales are suffering a similar problem which is lack of time because of their

main business work, Lack of Funnel Promotion Ideas, Lack of Traffic sources and some sort of, what I overcomplicating things syndrome”…...Having all this in mind and since we knew their demographic details we decided to go with a “Done For you” Approach for our Epic30days Challenge.

Starting this way…

Simple Headline, Straightforward message and very low number of friction points (potential onboarder clicks and actions) There were a lot of missteps that could have been avoided. And we should have begun with the mindset of building an agency so valuable that someone would want to buy it.

Disclaimer: Before you go for such initiative you need to So how do we reverse engineer success? I break it into 3 essential tasks. be sure you really know what to do..

We have started with a very bold objective

1. Find Great People

This is going to be EPIC

The 3 types of people who will help you grow your business are…

We have had a CRAZY idea...that could make a lot of • Mentors people a LOT of money!

• Referrers Imagine if We could MAKE 1000 people earn at least • And your team $1000 per month in passive income.

These are the people who will help you grow your business: co-founders, contractors, and employees.

I don’t mean show them or teach them…

I mean GIVE them the EXACT methods/ funnels/ traffic/email sequences/bots strategies/Facebook Ads Secrets sources that We are ACTUALLY using to earn over $12,000 per month in Passive Income.

So nothing is left to chance...

Well, that’s EXACTLY what We are going to do!

These 3 groups are the people you need to invest in.

But don’t overdo it.

You can run a lean operation of just 3-5 employees, then use strategic partnerships and contractors to get specific tasks done. This gives you a good margin and forces you to be disciplined.

2. Productize Your Services. You need a Tripwire.

We’ve set ourselves a MASSIVE challenge and We’ve Period. been working hard behind the scenes to make sure We Identify the thing that makes your offer unique. Sell pull it off. that and nothing else.

Tell a story with your sales presentation. You need to be both prescriptive and descriptive, so people walk away knowing who you are and what you do and how you differ from everyone else.

For us, the story is about “Helping people to get their first $1000/Mo on passive income Dollars in 30 days”.

It will be something else for your brand.

LEAD MAGNET + LANDING PAGE

Make it easy for your comers to sell themselves by positioning themselves on the grid of your offerings.

We have tested three different options, however, the best conversion is coming from the same video on Then make it easy (and fun) to get started with your Facebook Ads as in the landing page, therefore people Epic30days. already understand what we are going to achieve in When our Tripwire was a seminar or a happy hour, it advance and join immediately. wasn’t as successful. When we set up our first “Let’s go Addition: instead of using normal Opt-in button we and Do it”, we had double the prospects we decided to go with a Messenger Bot opt-in and instead of having email sequence we are taking on boarders through a bot sequence adding some extra value on this journey.

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anticipated.

your sales pitch alone but your ability to connect with your prospects.

For us, this worked well because we spot the exact pain points and fits perfectly on our new joiners needs “Done True growth happens if you can get your prospects to for you” Product sell—something I call “inception.” For this to happen, you need to develop a sales process that gets prospects 3. Sell Your Products the Right Way to sell themselves It’s important to evaluate your sales process as well VERY LOW-RISK FUNNEL as your offerings. Don’t just repackage a partner’s offerings. Contextualize them by fitting them into your We’ve decided to go with 30 days mainly because brand. Tweak them to reflect your unique strengths. of the “30 Days Money Back Guarantee” where even though we give everything to the comers to achieve their commissions, they might feel they cannot go ahead and stop, NOTHING HAPPEN. Actually, our abandon rate is ZERO!!!

FINAL MESSAGE GO FOR SIMPLE. Remember that perfection is the most dangerous enemy of something working well.

Always keep in mind, if all you’re doing is selling products, anyone can do that. If you’re selling empathy or relationship, you’ll need more nuance. It’s not about

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Article by Hilary Jastram

PhoneSites Turns Your Phone Into Funnel-Building Gold

Maybe you thought with all the different funnel platforms out there, that funnel construction had hit a wall? After all, what else could be done? As the saying goes, “there are no new inventions, only reinventions.”

But for one infamous entrepreneur, Ryan Stewman aka the Hardcore Closer, funnel status quo wasn’t satisfactory.

“Funnel” has become a buzzword flitting around boardrooms and in conference call dialogue without any real meaning. Some people simply want funnels because everyone has them and setting up a funnel seems to be the right action to take. This is #2018bestpractice But without value, what is a funnel? A conduit to zero dollars. A funnel should enable passive income, and the ability to scale. It is supposed to save you work, not compel you to figure what went wrong in the string of instructions.

Ummm...don’t we all feel that in spades?

Ryan says, “The average business owner and salesperson who didn’t have any tech skills couldn’t learn how to build a funnel fast enough. The technology was causing them to stall. I needed to either find or create something that was so easy a 90-year-old grandparent could figure out. But I couldn’t find it, so I created it.”

Even if you have the most rudimentary of technological skills, you’ll still be able to construct a funnel in five minutes from your smartphone -- no kidding.

And this past week, PhoneSites introduced training for their members, proving yet again that a company is only as good as their user-friendly rating.

But why should you care about PhoneSites as a funnel user and promoter? To put it plainly: “PhoneSites allows you to generate an endless pipeline of smoking hot leads.” And isn’t that what most business owners and marketing professionals are after...leads and the Calls-to-action, integration into your drip campaigns, understanding of what the heck a funnel even is, and the inclusion of stunning media, and it’s applicable to how it can benefit their business? every industry. But what’s your prerequisite? You simply need a solid lead-gen system and a desire to close PhoneSites breaks down a funnel into the basic steps more sales. that even a layperson can understand. This allows you to save money you would otherwise fork over to a funnel builder. It means you can link to your CRM, add videos, landing pages, emails, social media sites, and any content your little heart can dream up. Here’s

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an idea! Take your savings and reinvest it into your email platform. I know enough to break infrastructure, with minimal coding knowledge but, you don’t need company elsewhere. #digitalgenius any techie background. Experience with Facebook or Not crazy about building a funnel from your phone? any other social media site suffices to get you started.

Well, now you can log in on your laptop to build.

The latest news? How about sharing funnels simply by The most beautiful aspect of this program is the intuitive sending a link? Once they click, the funnel is loaded starter video that literally walks you through every step into their dashboard. If you sell funnels this speeds up of creating your PhoneSites funnel. You can use your the process. If you build funnels, you can collaborate. If selfies to sell (Ryan demonstrates this very concept), you make funnels, you will seriously uncomplicate your attach your logo, connect a lead magnet, install action life and tear up your productivity. buttons and disclaimers, and attach your FB pixel and URLs! With a minimally-priced subscription, (far less With close to 3K members and over 2600 users since than you would pay a funnel contractor), you’ll have their launch...PhoneSites has revolutionized the funnel access to building your own passive pipeline that can process while ensuring even the most junior users can start to generate cash the day you push it live! And the build an effective funnel to beef up their bottom line. worry that you won’t have time to build your own funnels is eliminated because the very goal of this program is to get your funnel up in five minutes! The claim is even in the slogan.

I hopped right in and moved through the designated sections with ease. Without any training (even though it is offered), this site had the same ESP functionality of any

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Article by Kristen Miller

Split Testing-3 Ways To Optimize Your Clickfunnels Funnel

That’s it! It’s official...your funnel isn’t converting and what works best. With Clickfunnels, we can create a second-page side by side the first and split the traffic you don’t know what’s wrong. between both pages.

You did EVERYTHING right, but it’s still not going well. So - is it time to quit or is it time to dig in your heels You can see the results of the test in real-time and easily tell which is performing better. Once you know which and read this article right here. one is best, you can simply disable the secondary page.

That’s what I thought! Stay with me here and I’ll break Clickfunnels allows you to easily create a split test page down 3 ways to optimize your funnel using split tests. to test different options directly on the platform. If you Split Testing - 3 Ways To Optimize Your Clickfunnels use a different funnel software, they probably offer a Sales Funnel similar option. The tips below will work regardless of Here’s the good news...it’s not your fault! Your first your software, but the exact steps will probably differ. funnel is your best guess on what people want and how Create a Split Test Page Using Clickfunnels: they want to receive it. Usually, your first funnel doesn’t Go to the page work!

I’m Kristen Miller and I’ve been designing and building Click Create Variation funnels for over a year. My favorite thing to do is to Click Create Duplicate Page watch in real-time as a split test I’ve made in a client’s funnel increases conversions.

Edit the second page When you want to start testing your funnels to increase Click Start Split Test button conversions, split testing is the best place to start.

Click Apply Changes button What is Split Testing?

When creating split tests, it’s best to start small. Change Also known as A/B testing, split testing is one or two things at a time, so you can minimize the when we try different things and see variables being tested. For example, if you only change the headline, you know for a fact that the increase (or decrease) in conversions is entirely headline related.

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This will help you as you continue to split test and see • Static Image • Video what works.

• Carousel Images You can split test as many times as you want, for as • No Image long as you want. We are always trying to make funnels better, so you might as well always be trying something Audiences new.

Things to watch out for when creating a Split Test with There are many different ways to target people with your ads. In particular, with Facebook ads, you can Clickfunnels: test different Interests, Demographics and Custom • You need to add the integration! The email Audiences. list information does not duplicate when you SPLIT TEST #2 - Your Opt-In Page duplicate the page for the split test. Be sure to add your email account, email list, and tags to Your opt-in page is (usually) the next step in the funnel, the new page. so it should be the next step in your split testing.

• Mobile Only information. Sometimes we have Mobile Only sections that are easy to forget Opt-In Headlines about. Always test your mobile view and make Change up the headline on the page. Make sure the sure the information there is still valid for your headline is directly related to whatever brought them split test page. to that page. If you are using Facebook ads, make • Page URL. If page URLs are important to you, sure your headline follows along from what they are make sure you clean up the auto-created Page expecting to see after they click on the ad.

URL by clicking on the gear icon next to the Edit page button.

Opt-In Copy If you have additional copy on the Opt-In Page, you can try changing these as well. Try appealing to The first three things you should test are your ads, your different pain points or features/benefits of the lead opt-in page, and your order form. magnet.

What should you Split Test?

SPLIT TEST #1 - Your Ads Ad Copy + Ad Images + Audiences Your ads are the entry point to your funnel. They are the first point someone sees of your funnel, so this can be a make or break piece. If your ads don’t convert, your potential customers won’t even see the actual funnel steps.

Note: You may be using something besides ads as the entry to your funnel. Whatever brings people into your Opt-In Design funnel - start there. It may be a Facebook Live or a Pinterest Pin. Perhaps there is something in the design you can change. I like to test short opt-in pages, with just a Ad Copy headline and the email subscribe boxes, versus longer Try multiple copy options for your ad. Some things copy opt-in pages with more descriptions. to test: long copy, short copy, emotional copy, direct SPLIT TEST #3 - Your Order Form Page response copy, emoji versus no emojis.

Optimize For Mobile Ad Images Facebook (in particular) has many different options for Images. Try a selection to see what works best. Mix and match with your copy to see what has the best conversions.

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These days, most people are buying from their iPad or phone. That’s very important to know because you want to make sure your page is set up for mobile users.

Things look completely different when they are built for viewing on computers versus viewing on phones.

respond to best. Under 100 page views is not a valid test audience. Be patient and wait to confidently decide which page performs better.

Next Level Testing

If you aren’t seeing a measurable improvement from Make sure your order form is SIMPLE and easy to the above split tests, it’s time to take a look at your offer follow on mobile. and your funnel type.

Payment Options Funnel Type Do you offer Paypal? For the longest (seriously, the I’ve had success in the past by changing the WAY longest) time, Clickfunnels didn’t integrate natively with we were offering the same product. Perhaps you Paypal. This was a huge deal for my clients because started with a webinar funnel - try changing it into a their customers wanted the convenience of paying with Tripwire funnel where part of the product is used as an Paypal. immediate sale offer and the rest is sold via email and Now that Paypal is an option, have you set it up or are a sales page. you leaving money on the table?

Offer Order Bumps Do your potential customers just not want what you Order bumps are a fantastic way to offer a small have to offer? It’s possible. If you get to this point, little upsell to your product on the Order Form. This is consider taking a deep dive into what problem you are definitely something you can play with to see if you can solving and if it’s aligned with your product. increase your cart value. Some things to try: change the Have personal conversations with your target audience item, change the title, change the description, change and ask them what they think - in depth. Note: This the price, and add or remove an image.

NEEDS to be personal. Surveys won’t work. You need And if you don’t have an order bump yet - add one to have a real conversation and see what their actual right now! objections are.

Analyzing your split test

After your split test

After you have started your split test, how do you know After you have tried a few split tests, you can start to see what is working? if your funnel conversions will improve (hopefully!)

Clickfunnels makes it easy to analyze the information.

Each page Edit box turns red or blue and it tells you what it thinks with a percentage confidence score.

Once you have run through enough traffic to make an informed decision, stop the split test.

The point is that you need to stick with one thing long enough to know if it’s really going to work or not. Too often people quit because their funnel doesn’t “work” in the first month.

Quitting too soon is a short-sighted marketing problem.

If you truly believe that your product or service can change lives, then you’re dedicated to making sure your Click the Declare As Winner button on the winning potential clients see what you have to offer. page How to stop a split test in Clickfunnels:

Click Ok on the “Are you sure?” popup The losing page gets archived and the winning page stays in the funnel Don’t stop a split test too soon! It takes a while to accumulate the data needed to decide what people

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Article by Alex Taylor

Our 4 Step ‘Rapid Optimization Matrix’ To Optimizing Your Sales Funnels For Higher Conversions And To Scale On Demand

The Optimization strategies we’re going to share with you today are some of the exact procedures that we take to optimize & manifest continuous performance gains for our worldwide clients.

This process allows us to know exactly what section, element, and even color are working or not, without the confusion of not remembering what you’ve previously tested.

When you find your sales funnel is displaying some form of results, and you believe that it may be ‘the one,’ this is typically where most people go wrong & potentially sabotage their whole campaign.

Our ‘Rapid Optimization Matrix’ is responsible for creating some of the highest performing landing pages in the industry and has helped even seasoned funnels amplify their performance and generate millions in added revenue from stronger metrics.

Often, the ‘standard protocol’ to optimize your sales funnel is to create a split test, change up some headlines, With these 4 Steps, you’ll find clarity in your optimization colors and even throw in a countdown timer in the hope process, allowing you to replicate the same results that that It does something. we create for our clients.

What if there was a more strategical and systemized Step 1: The eyes of the customer solution?

Our number #1 rule before sending traffic to our funnel A way where you could step inside of your viewer’s brain is to ensure that we have ‘our eyes’ installed. and start to dissect their exact thought processes, their Our eyes are what allow us to see everything that is objections and the reasons for NOT pulling the trigger. going on inside of our sales funnel, just like you’d use Over our years of optimizing sales funnels, we have your eyes in the real world. developed a systematical process to gaining a deep Our way of seeing what is going on in our sales funnels understanding of why a campaign may be performing is by using a platform called ‘Hotjar’ (there are other the way it is, and if necessary, what we can do to return variations you can use like Mopinion, FreshMarketer, a positive result.

CrazyEgg and many more...)

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Hotjar is a Heatmap Tracking Software that allows you to understand what your user wants, cares about and interacts with on your site, by visually representing their VOLUME 3

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clicks, taps and scrolling behavior.

your next sales funnel.

Heatmap tracking software can be extremely beneficial A Stand-a-lone Frequently Asked Questions section to understanding your viewers better and optimizing is beneficial, but unless your user feels the need to your campaigns with the information you learn inside. highlight the text while reading, you’re going to find it hard to know what they’re focusing their attention on.

If you look at all of your viewing activity from a wideangle lens, you can gauge things like the average time This is where our Custom Frequently Asked Questions that a viewer is spending on your page, if they’ve left section is going to come into play, and yes! We’re going your page just after reading a certain piece of content to give it to you for free today. (You can copy & paste it at the bottom of this article along with a step-by-step and many more pieces of useful information. guide. (for use in Clickfunnels)) Things you can look for when using heatmap tracking Inside of your heatmap tracking software, you’ll be able software is: to see what Frequently Asked Questions the viewer is - Where is the viewer pausing/hovering/reading over? clicking on, giving you a clear indication of what they - What part of the page did they view before they want to know. dropped off?

If you’re repeatedly seeing viewers clicking and viewing the same question, try incorporating that question into your sales message. This will give your viewers - How long are they spending on your page before, or confidence in you and your offer because you’re without, performing an action? displaying that you know what they want before the For example, if a viewer is spending a considerable questions even populate into their brain! (Smart, huh?) amount of time on your page without performing an Once you have started split testing this and see positive action, this may ring some alarm bells that something on results when added into your copy, you can change out your page is stopping them, or they may be displaying that question, replace it with a different question that that they have some uncertainty behind what you’re you believe your viewer may be thinking, and restart presenting. this process again.

- What are they clicking/trying to click?

There are some initial considerations you can gain from Step 3: ‘First Person’ Call To Actions this information, things that may be causing the viewer A useful tip we’ve acquired over the years of splitnot to act. testing is that talking in the first person when using Call - Try split test your content/offer in a way that gives To Action’s work very well. more urgency/scarcity for the viewer to perform the Instead of using a standard call to action like: ‘Buy action requested.

Now,’ or ‘Download Your Free Guide,’ try changing - Look at the content/information that is displayed on the Call To Action to something that your viewer would the page, Is it too pushy? Does it have a ‘spammy’ feel? actually say.

Are you not being direct enough?

For example, ‘Yes, I Need This!’, or ‘Send Me My Free There are many further considerations when optimizing Copy.’ your sales funnel; When using the information gained from heatmaps correctly, you will find that it can Using a call to action while speaking in the first person become the main structure behind making decisions uses a psychological technique that helps the viewer to simplify their understanding of what you’re asking from for optimization changes. them. (Although in our eyes It’s a simple task, we’re Step 2: Show me what you want to know eliminating any potential ‘brain-blocks’ and removing Using your Heatmap tracking software doesn’t stop all uncertainty.) there, in fact, the next step in our process is one of the Depending on the context of your message, you can most crucial parts of our strategies that we implement enhance this further by using more emotional to optimize our funnels. language in your Call To Actions, like: If you’re not already using ‘Frequently Asked Questions’ ‘Yes! I Deserve This’, or ‘I Need in your sales funnel, congratulations! You’ve gained a golden nugget of information you can use to test in

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This.’

- Is it clear what action I’m asking the viewer to perform?

When using Call To Action’s in the first person, don’t be - Am I making it as simple as possible for that viewer to afraid to use multiple variations throughout the same execute the action? page, for example: Once you answer these questions and rectify the parts [Section 1] of your funnel which you may have answered no, you’ll more than likely find a far more positive response from In this guide, you’re going to receive all of the useful your audience. information that you need to be able to achieve [X] Ensure that your message to the viewer is clear and [Call To Action] try split testing your pages with a simpler design, using clean color schemes and easier to read fonts.

Yes! I Want To achieve [X] You can get started straight away by using some of these techniques in your optimization process and Testimonial: “using this free guide, I have been able within no time, we’re confident that you’ll start seeing to remove [Y] without having to do [Z], I highly more positive results from this systemized approach. recommend this free guide!”

Good luck!

- Annie Mannie.

Frequently Asked Questions Code + Guide: [Call To Action] (Clickfunnels) I Want To Remove [Y] Like Annie!

Step 1: Create a Custom HTML Element inside your [Section 2]

Step 4: Simplicity Rules!

funnel.

Sometimes, even after split testing with multiple changes, the most visually appealing & descriptive sales funnels we’ve created are not always the highest converting.

To give you a simple answer of why this may be, in short, visual overwhelm.

When creating a sales funnel, you may be prioritizing Step 2: Click & Select ‘Open Code Editor’ the design of the page rather than the message itself and how it’s displayed to the viewer.

When a sales funnel is messy & unclear, the viewer may be subconsciously thinking ‘this is too much for me to take in’ or depending on how messy we’re talking, ‘where am I supposed to go from here?’, This is a common issue in sales funnels and also one of the biggest reasons why they’re leaving your page.

Step 3: Copy & Paste the ‘HTML’ Code Below and It’s important to remember why that user is visiting insert into the code editor. HTML Code: http://txt.do/ your page; they’re more than likely there because of dn08g the curiosity they gained from your Advertisement and to learn more information about your offer, or based on your advertisement, they have a degree of certainty that they’re wanting to perform the action. (Opt-in, Purchase, Etc.) When stepping into the eyes of your viewer, ask yourself these questions:

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- Is my message clear & easy to understand?

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Step 4: Change where it says ‘Question 1,2,3,4,5’ to

your questions, and change the Answer 1,2,3,4,5 to Step 7: (Advanced) If you would like to change the text color, scroll down to .faq-q and change the color code your Answers. to your desired color.

Step 5: Head to the top left of the editor and select settings, then select Custom CSS

Step 7b (Advanced): If you would like to change the color of the + drop-down icon, scroll down to .faq t and change to color to your desired color.

Step 6: Copy & Paste the ‘Custom CSS’ into here.

Custom CSS Code: http://txt.do/dn08h

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Article by Charly Wigstrom

Case Study: How Our Facebook Ads campaigns

Case Study: How our Facebook Ads campaigns Generated 85¢ Leads Using A Simple Chatbot and our Secret targeting strategy Messenger Marketing is growing up fast.

Campaign Goals & Background A local Mexican restaurant called Fiesta Mexicana wanted to promote an offer. The winners would each receive a free meal for two, and everyone else got a coupon for a free appetizer just for entering.

It wasn’t that long ago that nobody had even heard of Fiesta Mexicana’s goal was to promote this offer to as it. But today? many people as possible, as cheaply as possible, and Today even small local companies are using it to attract help bring more people into the restaurant. interested leads and help turn them into new customers.

I knew there was a lot of potential for using Messenger And in this post, I’m going to share a complete Marketing to promote an offer like this, so I decided to walkthrough of a Facebook Messenger campaign that test it out. was, by any measure, a huge success. Just take a look at some of the statistics: The results, as you’ll see, were impressive.

• 5% conversion rate • 100% open rate • 99% click-through rate Even more importantly, this campaign generated qualified leads for just 85¢ apiece!

And the best news is that this campaign isn’t complicated or difficult to set up. In fact, chances are good that you’ll be able to copy and tweak this campaign to fit your business needs in just an hour or two of work.

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Step 1: Facebook Ad The first thing our leads saw was this Facebook ad telling them about the promotion:

It’s a simple image ad but worked really well to spread From here you just have to click “View it in Messenger” to open up the chatbot. the news of their promotion.

(If I were to do this campaign over again, I would If I were to do this over again, I would probably use definitely test a video ad. That way I would be able to the “Facebook Ads JSON” growth tool, rather than the retarget people who watched part of the video without “Landing Page” tool, inside of ManyChat. converting.)

The ad targeting I used was also fairly straightforward.

I tested a few different age groups, and simply targeted people who liked Mexican food—burritos, tacos, tequila, salsa, and so on—who lived within 10 miles of the restaurant itself.

Here you can see we spent a total of $146.12, reached over 9,000 people and generated 305 clicks (cost per click of 48¢).

Once a person clicked on the ad, they were taken to…

The Landing Page tool worked fine, but I don’t like the fact that it requires 2 clicks to reach the chatbot. The I didn’t use the “Send Message” call-to-action for this JSON growth tool would accomplish the same thing campaign. Instead, I used one of ManyChat’s free in fewer clicks and might have improved our landing growth tools to create a super-simple opt-in landing page conversion rate. page. Here’s what the landing page looked like: (RELATED: How to Build a Simple Facebook Step 2: Landing Page

Messenger Bot with ManyChat)

Step 3: Chatbot Coupon Delivery After you click through to reach the chatbot, the first message makes it super easy to enter the drawing—just click the button to enter:

When you click the button, the page turns red and updates like so:

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I wanted to keep track of everyone who entered the Then we sent them a coupon for their free appetizer: contest, so I tagged anybody who clicked this button with the tag “Entered free meal contest” and subscribed them to our VIP Offers sequence.

The point of the coupon, of course, was to help draw more people into the restaurant and turn them into long-term patrons.

So in order to achieve that goal, we needed to maximize So how well did this message work? Take a look for the number of people who actually redeemed their yourself. coupon.

It was delivered to 173 people. Everyone opened it, Step 4: Chatbot Coupon Redemption and nearly everyone—171 people, or 98.8%—clicked the button to enter the contest.

It wasn’t enough to simply give people a coupon. We wanted people to actually USE the coupon—to come into the restaurant for a meal.

So I wanted to make it as easy as possible to redeem the coupon.

Giving people a printable coupon seemed like a bad idea. I didn’t think many people would go through the effort of actually printing out the coupon and bringing it with them to the restaurant.

Once the visitor clicked that button, we sent them a few So instead, I just told people to show this message on messages explaining how the contest worked: their phone to their server:

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Their server would then click the “Appetizer Redeemed” That’s a 19% redemption rate—pretty impressive, button, redeeming the coupon. considering those people had to actually visit the restaurant to redeem their coupon!

Once that happened, I made sure to tag the user so that we would know who had actually come into the restaurant to redeem their coupon:

So you may be wondering: How did you get such a high coupon redemption rate?

Well, the answer to that has to do with the final step in this campaign…

The final message that users saw, after redeeming their Step 5: Reminder coupon, was a simple thank-you: People are busy, and we know it’s easy to forget about something like a coupon for a free appetizer.

So I made sure to send people a reminder message several days after they entered the contest.

Once again, you can see that our open and clickthrough rates were very high. Here’s what the message looked like:

This is a pretty short & simple message, but it actually has some powerful psychology behind it.

First, notice that we reinforce the fact that the coupon If you take a look at the stats, you’ll see that this thank- will expire on August 31st. This creates a sense of you message was sent to 33 people. Which means urgency in the reader’s mind. that out of 171 people who entered the contest, 33 of them actually came into the restaurant to redeem the coupon.

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(After all, nobody wants to miss out on something The Coolest Thing About This Campaign that’s free!)

When I ran this campaign for the client, I was thrilled at Second, I ask the reader to commit in advance to the results we were able to generate. visit the website. Out of 170 people who opened this But even more impressive, I think, is the massive message, about 30 of them clicked “Yes I will!” and potential it shows for the future of Messenger marketing another 30 clicked “Not this week.” in general.

The goal behind those buttons was to get people to I mean think about it, guys. This campaign wasn’t run pre-commit to coming in for a meal. by some massive tech company with unlimited resources My theory was that if people commit to visiting the and a huge marketing department. restaurant, even if they’re just clicking a button in This was a standalone Mexican restaurant in Spokane, Messenger, it makes them more likely to actually follow Washington. through on that commitment.

If a small local business can use Messenger marketing And as I mentioned above, it worked really well! with this much success in their very first try, just imagine Overall this reminder message was successful. It wasn’t what YOU can do—especially after you’ve had a few perfect, of course. If I had the chance to run it over chances to refine and improve it to fit your business. again, I would probably tweak this reminder message a little bit.

Instead of jumping right to the promotional message, I would probably start by asking a quick & easy question first—something like, “Do you still want that FREE appetizer you won? (Yes/No)” It’s not a huge change, but starting the message this way would have probably improved the engagement rate of this reminder message and maybe got a few more people to come inside and redeem their coupon.

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A Robust Ecommerce Strategy Should Encompass Paid Search & SEO ARTICLE BY Al Sefati

One of the classic debates in digital marketing circles is over the merits of paid search (aka PPC) versus SEO. Some marketers have a hobby horse, really advocating for one over the other, but the reality is that both are immensely valuable. In fact, the best approach to marketing is integration—synthesizing paid search and SEO, aligning them to the same purpose.

content you’ve developed—for example, blogs, e-books, or downloadable product guides.

Implement sitelinks. Another approach is to implement sitelinks within AdWords, a proven way to bring more visibility to your best content.

Tweak your copywriting. Finally, writing AdWords copy can give you a clear sense of what resonates and That’s because, while different, paid search and SEP what doesn’t for your target audience. That can be can be highly complementary. The important principle useful information as you do some SEO copywriting is to have an overall strategy in place that harmonizes or blogging. these twin disciplines, pointing them both toward the same basic goal.

Finding PPC Opportunities in SEO This is especially true in e-commerce marketing—but On the flipside, the analytics you gather from your how exactly can you synchronize your paid search and SEO endeavors can provide guidance for your PPC. SEO efforts? Here are some tips.

Some examples of this include: Gleaning SEO Opportunities from PPC Data

Finetune your budgeting. You may have PPC keywords you want to hit, but they’re simply too competitive.

First, note that your supply of PPC data can provide Bridge the gap by doubling down on SEO content that some helpful direction for SEO endeavors. Here’s how: targets these same keywords.

Share keyword data. Selecting the “Search Query Improve landing pages. You can also add SEOreports” option in AdWords can be in an invaluable valuable content to your landing pages, which can help way to determine the organic keywords you should be you raise the Quality Score for PPC ads. This not only focusing on. boosts your ad ranking, but it can also cut down on Embrace remarketing. You can also your cost per click. use PPC to promote the creative Investigate traffic patterns. Finally, remember to use your organic search data to help plot your PPC spending—a smart way to decide when to push content, VOLUME 3 etc.

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Take the Integrative Approach

And, competitor research can be a little bit murky, as your PPC competitors may not totally overlap with your E-commerce marketers shouldn’t have to choose SEO competitors. between PPC and SEO. Both can be immensely valuable, especially when they are used in tandem.

With those drawbacks noted, though, integrative marketing is still the way to go for e-commerce It’s worth noting that there can be some drawbacks marketing. Remember: You don’t have to take sides. here. For example, site downtime will not only impact PPC and SEO work best when they work together.

SEO but also diminish the efficacy of your PPC efforts.

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Psychology Of Social Selling Article by Megan Flanagan

Everyone is always selling. It is always pretty obvious • Engage- bring you into the sales process when someone is selling a product or a service to • Enrich- how does what they are selling affect you you but how often do you not realize you are being • Entertain-relax, make it not so serious. Have sold to? fun, capture people’s attention It is happening every moment of every day.

They engage their audience thru the live TV and phone When you sell successfully and ethically there are 3 calls and now Social Media platforms. They entertain things you should be able to get the customer to do: by selling in a way that makes the customer “tune in”, then they enrich the customer’s life by bringing them • Like you –this is your “gut” feeling when you value. All of this was done back in the 80’s on live meet someone; 1st impression television.

• Know you -getting to know someone thru conversation or back and forth exchange There are “Master Sales” people out there who can • Trust you -Once someone trust you, they are close any sale, but at the end of the day if they close open to being “sold” to. a sale and the client /customer feels bad/pressured/ QVC is a Shopping Network where I spent just over 10 uncomfortable with the sales process. What does years as a Planner & Buyer. They broadcast to that leave you with? approximately 350 Million households in seven A customer who is not happy with you and your sales countries. The reason they are successful is that they tactics. This customer will tell people about their have always directed their On-Air salespeople to sell in bad experience and will never recommend you/your a manner called “ The Back Yard Fence ”. This product/service to anyone. phrase was coined to remind the On Air salesperson to I am currently a Social Media Manager and a Coach sell the product as if they were speaking to their for Rachel Pedersen’s Social Media United. I have neighbor over the backyard fence. It is never a high the opportunity to teach the students and one of my pressure, scream at the top of your lungs approach favorite subjects to teach is about a book I recently to selling. It is a simple, friendly conversation with your read a few years back called “Influence: The Psychology neighbor who you like, know, and trust. of Persuasion ” by Dr. Robert B. Cialdini. In this When QVC was launched in 1986, this is the approach book he identifies and discusses 6 Universal Principles they took while other shopping networks went for the of Persuasion: quick, loud sale and QVC quickly because of the leader in this space. QVC also utilized the 3 E’s : • Reciprocity –you help me, I’ll help you • Scarcity - oh no it is going away • Authority -you know what you are doing • Consistency -you do what you say will do • Liking - people like YOU! • Consensus - the larger group agrees on a subject

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The first Principle I always dive into with the SMU students is “Liking”. Here are just some of the important

factors regarding this principle that Dr. Cialdini The lesson we learned in this Case Study was to get to identified: know someone first, then look for areas of • We like people who are similar to us • We like people who pay us compliments • We like people who cooperate with us and help us reach our goals

similarity and share that similarity, then genuinely compliment them before you start talking business.

This lesson resonated with me when I first started as a Social Media Manager not only in the way I

Take the extra step to getting your customer to “like” approach clients but in the way, I approach growing you can go a very long way, especially in regards clients’ audiences on every Social Platform. It goes to Social Media Marketing and growing your audiences. back to the first thing we spoke about: There is an example in Dr. Cialdini’s book about a Case • KNOW Study done by the Stanford business school. A • LIKE • TRUST group of business students was put into two groups.

Group one was told “time equals money”, don’t So whether you are creating social media content, waste any time, to negotiate the deal quickly, and Facebook Ad Headlines and copy or Copy for your make the sale. Group one came back with a 55% funnels it’s always good to keep in mind the Principle’s success rate on closing their sales with full contract and of Persuasion and how you are going to agreement signed. Not bad right? approach your future customer or your existing customer Group two was told to get to know each other first, to get them to opt into your offer, join your exchange information with each other, and share a group, or like your post. one personal thing about yourself, then try to identify a similarity that you share with each other. You have to do all this BEFORE you talk business with your future client. Group two came back with a 90% success rate and their signed agreements were typically worth 18% more than Group one.

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The Best Social Media Platforms for Creatives That You May Not Have Discovered Yet Article by Ruby Woodman

Behance Behance is a great platform for showcasing your portfolio and discovering other creatives’ work. It is owned by Adobe and boasts more than a million members. Other users can directly subscribe to and comment on your portfolio, making it a great way to get feedback or critique from friends and colleagues.

If you’re worried about privacy then Behance also

For creatives, the world of social media is an exciting place, full of endless possibilities and the opportunity to network, share content and collaborate. Many of you will already be familiar with sites such as Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest etc, however, there are numerous other social networking sites that offer creatives the chance to share ideas and get inspired. Here are a few of our favorite social media platforms you may not lets users have complete control over their audience have discovered yet: allowing you to decide exactly who sees your portfolio, Ello and who you want to collaborate with. The great thing Ello was created as an ad-free alternative to other about Behance is that it is multi-media friendly allowing existing social networks. It is free to use; however, creatives to upload still images, audio files, and video users can upgrade if they want to pay for premium with ease. features. The site was created 4 years ago and is now The network offers creatives of all kinds a place to a haven for artists, photographers and other creatives showcase their work to potential clients, as well as to looking to share their work. Ello excels over platforms connect with other creatives. It does this by making it like Facebook/Instagram in several areas. For one, easy for users to assemble an attractive portfolio of Ello doesn’t use any frustrating algorithm-based feeds their work, organized by project, which is then available to display content, instead, all feeds are displayed for visitors to browse. chronologically. There are also no ads, no sponsored posts, and no business profiles. Ello is much more user- Are.na friendly than most social media networking sites and Are.na is a platform created by artists for creatives who censorship rules are much less strict. You can also wish to collect, curate or share images with each other. upload images of any ratio and they won’t Are.na differs from many other social networking sites be compressed to ridiculous proportions due to it is strict “no ads policy” and the fact there is no like some other social media sites. ability to “like” other people’s posts - a trait that according to the sites creators can encourage content such as VOLUME 3

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selfies that feeds into people’s insecurities. According to its creators, the site is a healthier, creativity-boosting alternative to traditional social media platforms such as Instagram and Facebook. Are.na currently has over 33,000 users, most of whom are artists, designers or architects. It is free to use however users can pay to upgrade to premium services.

Jumptin

Jumptin is billed by its creators as a “brand new creative community aimed at freelancers and creatives who want to share ideas and network.” The site actively discourages users from trying to sell to each other, instead of promoting the site as a place to collaborate

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and inspire. Jumptin is currently free for the first 1005 members that sign up. However, if you don’t fall into this category, then the site charges a membership fee of $6.99 (around £5) a month. This might seem quite costly for a site that is only just finding its feet, however, one of the big pluses of Jumptin being subscription only is that you don’t get any pesky ads popping up – a welcome change from other social networking sites.

Overall the site compares favorably to other social media platforms aimed at creatives and users have the ability to ask the rest of the community questions as well as being able to post their own polls. For more information, click here to visit the site’s homepage.

Grow Pa st The L aptop L ifes

tyle

// Kate Mikado

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in the forefront all of the time that the people that you serve are real people. Those are the two magic pieces I think that most people shy away from.”

Grow Past The Laptop Lifestyle Intro by Tricia Wilkes

This edition we have Kaelin and Brandon Poulin, the founders and creators of Lady Boss, not only have they created an absolutely incredible community that started from them walking on the treadmill at Planet Fitness. They are also helping women all around the world lose weight and love themselves.

Their uplifting interview with Hawk is complete with Gold Nuggets of game changing tips that you can put in place today to have a better business and a healthy lifestyle!

Brandon tells Hawk about an open lawsuit as an example of the trials and tribulations they are currently experiencing “You could go on and about the trials and tribulations of growing a company but at the end of the day, I think what I really learned in presenting that whole thing to that group that we were just kind of talking about is that we don’t ever focus on it. It’s just we take it in stride and It feels like you get punched in the gut but then in that same moment you just have to go, okay, what can we do. Let’s focus on a solution and let’s figure it out. I think that’s been you know” Kaelin adds that “Yeah, and one of the cool things here at Lady Boss, we have this mentality here and all of our team here has a mentality of what problem are we gonna fix and solve today?”

Sales Pipeline

Hawk asks about the percentage of automation in their business Brandon says “We try to automate Create The Leverage everything that we can and then Brandon says to Hawk about the everything else becomes human two magic pieces that helped them be able to scale to 32 million dollars a year in just four years “Do we wanna be just laptop funnel people or do we wanna have a real company, right? So in that transition is where you make a decision that you can’t do it alone, you have to build a team, you have to create leverage and there are people out there that are way better than you at certain things and letting go and equipping people. There’s a lot of leadership that I think goes into that scale. Really focusing on who we’re helping and why we’re helping them and I think just keeping that

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resources, right? You pretty quickly reach a point where you can automate emails and you can automate... I mean to a point you can automate advertising. It does much better with people behind it, but I think we automate what we can and we create efficiencies with software and technology where we can. I think at this point there’s only so much you can do that with and having great people, I think they’re the ultimate resource, to be honest with you. I think there lots of technology, some’s great, some’s not, some stuff you can do manually that you can do automatic but ultimately when you have good people, when you have people that are competent and have character and are committed to what you’re doing, I think that’s the ultimate resource at this level. When you look at Fortune 500 companies, when you look at big companies, they’re built on amazing talent. I was reading a letter from Elon that he sent to all of his team about some promotions and people that have raised up and you could see just the talent that he had on his team and the people that he had recruited from other companies and anyways, so at that level I think it’s definitely a human resource game but there’s... when you can automate stuff with

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funnels and emails and you really take advantage of that, I think to create that sales pipeline is probably the biggest thing in automation for us.”

A Tried And True Kind Of Offer Brandon “We have a seven day free experienced to our program that we offer. And that’s been a really good one. Seven day free trials, if you look at iTunes and Prime and all the big companies. That’s a tried and true kind of offer. We also just go straight to the product themselves. So we sell our supplemental lines straight to the product page. So it just depends. And that’s what’s funny, I think people think that funnels are like, “Oh if I just get this offer or this price point or whatever, I’m going to have success.” But at the end of the day, it’s where the traffic comes from, how they get warmed up, it’s the story that’s told, right? It’s like, we’ve had a million people go and try to knock off what we’re doing.

It would blow your mind, it would literally blow your mind!”

Your Heart Follows Where You Put Your Treasure Hawk asks about their value ladder starting with such a low end offer to their coaching program and Brandon says “The coaching program is $4,999 for the year.

So we’re just instituting that price increase. And they can pay $497 a month. And it’s a 12-month commitment. So we have a phone team and basically, people apply and they get on the phone and that’s how we ascend them into that top tier. Because for us, it’s like ...

It’s a lot of work to put together a phone team, sales processes, scripts, commission plans, all the things that come along with that. And then to have coaching, so we have a very serious process of vetting and onboarding coaches. We get about 250 coaching applications ... 250 VOLUME 3 * FUNNEL MAGAZINE

people that apply to be a health coach for Lady Boss every single month. And so for us, it’s a filtration process. And then we put them through a two-week certification.

And then we ultimately connect that customer with them. So that’s kind of like the upper end. And for us, it’s like we love that program because that’s where people get the most results. Because they’re the most invested. Your heart follows where you put your treasure. And so, if you’re investing in that high tier, and you’ve got a coach, you’ve got that ultimate level of accountability, and you’ve got coaches that really care, that’s where we can help them the most. So we love that program. It’s a lot of fun.”

Newsflash!

Hawk asks about Voicemails drops and Slide Broadcasts and Brandon says “Yeah, totally. We do one. And we tell them it’s recorded. We don’t pretend like we’re a real person and we left them a voicemail. Because honestly, I think people miss out a lot because they don’t market and sell on the premise that their customer is intelligent and they understand what’s going on.” Kaelin says “Your customer knows what you’re doing.

Newsflash!”Brandon continues “And so we do use one. We actually recorded it with the whole team and we invited them into the community with a voicemail. And so it’s like, “Hey, we want to welcome you to Lady Boss. We’re recording this right now. We’re in our whole company huddle.” And we had everyone scream.” Kaelin then says “Say hi, and they’re all like, “Hi!” Welcoming people to their amazing community with this honest and straightforward message leads to the beginning relationship and adventure as becoming The Lady Boss!

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Lady Boss Culture And Manifesto Kaelin goes further into the One of a Kind Community the The Boss Lady Community is with raving fans.

The famous manifesto that creates that uplifting mindset that these changes and being the lady boss is possible. Kaelin says “This is the one thing that sets Lady Boss apart from other weight loss companies.

Everyone else looks like a “plan” out there. There are a million companies with our model, right? Help women losing weight, give them plans, workouts. Help them get active, that type of thing. But the thing that makes us different is we truly give them this identity shift when they come in. We change who they are as a person and their belief about themselves. And so when they come in, the community and the culture that you’re talking about, it’s like, “I’m stepping into becoming a Lady Boss now.” The excuses that I used to make, I’m not going to make any more. And they have a manifesto where it’s like, “I am confident. I am amazing. I take action. I make no excuses. I kick butt. I’m unstoppable.

I’m a Lady Boss.” And they read this to themselves and they are in agreement and committing to that as their identity. So it truly shifts their entire mindset. How they see our plan, how they see our programs, that they can do it. And really just stopping a lot of negative self-talk that women have. And helping them believe that, “Now I have this plan.

Now I believe I can do it. I believe that I can accomplish these things.”

And with our culture, it’s a culture of where women can actually empower each other and lift each other up.

Instead of ... On the outside world, it feels like women are catty with each other or dragging each other down or talking about each other or gossiping. I’m like, “None of that is allowed here. We are going to support each other.” We have such

are the top five things that we’re doing today. And we pull those from what we call our airlock. Which is where we put all action items, period. So I could pull my airlock right now and show the next year of Game Changer what the company is going to do.

Hawk asks what’s the ONE BIG Because I saved every little good GAME CHANGER they would idea that I want to execute, right? tell the readers to do that they can So planning your day. Number implement today to see the biggest one, what did we do yesterday? change. Brandon steals Kaelin’s Number two, what are we going answer of Alignment Brandon to do today? And we both get in “So every single morning, Kaelin alignment on what we did and what and I at the same time, we get in we’re going to do. And as a married alignment. What that means is, couple, it’s huge, because you get number one, we talk about what into little fights here and there about did we do yesterday? What did we whatever. Who’s dropping what and get done yesterday? And taking the who’s taking what car or whatever. few minutes to plan your day, the And as business partners, a lot of 15 minutes to plan your week. And times we just kind of just go and an hour to plan your month. And a wander off. We have no idea what couple of hours to plan your quarter each other is doing, what our focus and the day to plan your year is is. So we get in alignment. The next absolutely a game changer. thing we do is look at our calendar So like the alignment is the execution together.” Kaelin says “We say where of that at the micro level. So what we are uncomfortable.” Brandon did we do yesterday? And then the adds “And then the thing after that next thing is, what are we going to is, we ask the question, “Where were do today? And for us, we have a you uncomfortable yesterday?” planning system where we put, here And so that gives us the ability firm standards, high standards that we hold in our community that it just raises everyone up to become the best version of themselves. Which makes us different.”

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to ... Whatever is in our personal relationship. If it was something in business or something we were uncomfortable with. Because a lot of times, as entrepreneurs, we tolerate too much. And we wait until an explosion before we really deal with stuff, because we’re so busy or whatever. And so, we ask that question, “Where were you uncomfortable?” The next thing we ask is, “Where can I support you today?” So we get to find out how we can support each other. So you can see, even if you’re doing it yourself, looking at, “Where was I uncomfortable yesterday? Where do I need to redirect or find support for myself in this thing?” Or find someone who’s maybe better at doing copy, because I don’t like it.

Or someone who’s better at doing this kind of thing in my business, whatever it may be. And then the last thing that we do is we pray together and then we crush it off into our day.

So just getting in alignment with your business partner, with yourself.

And taking that minute to plan your day, look at what you’re doing, ask those questions ... Is absolutely a game changer.”

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Kaelin and Brandon leave us with so many more game changers that you will just have to read the full interview Including more on the following quote “There’s Those Who Play The Game And Then There’s Those Who Make The Game” Your Breakthrough Awaits In reading the full Interview below!

The Interview Interview with Hawk Mikado

Hawk: Hello and welcome everybody. This is Hawk Mikado, the funnel genius, and publisher of Funnel magazine. Today we are here with Kaelin and Brandon Poulin, the founders and creators of Lady Boss and not only have they created an absolutely incredible community, but they are also helping women all around the world lose weight and love themselves more. They help them invest in themselves by voting with their dollar and have built a 32 million dollar company just recently featured in Forbes magazine and have 70 full-time employees in multiple different states.

Boss and we do it together. We’ve been super blessed but so yeah, we started, what I think, four years ago now?

average woman create wins and get to a place where she likes who she sees in the mirror, whether that’s weight wise or mentality. Then we Kaelin: Four years ago now. Almost just started developing thatexactly, in October it’ll be four years. Brandon: She forgot the part Brandon: Yeah and we had this where she set a world record in crazy moment in a Planet Fitness the International Federation of on a treadmill where we literally Bodybuilding. Yeah. walked and talked for three years and designed the future of what we wanted our life to be and how we wanted to serve people. We were previously in a weight loss company, which is actually how we met.

Kaelin: In network marketing, yeah.

Brandon: Yeah, in a network marketing company. We decided to take a turn. We were successful in that company but it wasn’t heading the direction that we wanted it to and so we stepped back and said how can we help people and serve people on our own and that’s kind of when we created the whole thing on the treadmill and designed what is now the Lady Boss lifestyle and created a community and yeah, it’s They’ve got six 2 Comma Club been crazy. awards and a 2 Comma Club X award, which means you have Kaelin: What he didn’t say is we one funnel that’s making you eight were flat broke. We were seriously so figures. So welcome and thanks for broke and we were like, what are we being here. gonna do? We can’t... we’re behind on car payments. We’re behind on Kaelin: Yeah, thanks for having us. rent. What are we actually gonna Brandon: Glad to be here, man. do and then we were looking around like, how do we have an online Hawk: Absolutely, so can you share type business where we can kind of a little bit about how you guys have the lifestyle that we want and ended up getting started both with that’s when we came across what Lady Boss and then the version of a funnel is and at that point we’re Lady Boss that was prior to it? like, oh, we could totally do this. We Brandon: Yeah, absolutely, man. literally spent the next two months Glad to be here, glad to be on, just holed up, in a cave, with giant and we just love helping anybody whiteboards, creating a product else that we can and share their cause we knew that what we were superpower and their gift with the good at is helping women lose world and it’s been super a blessing weight. I’ve lost 65 pounds myself for us to get to work together. Kaelin and it’s something I’m extremely and I are totally partnered in Lady passionate about. Just helping the VOLUME 3 * FUNNEL MAGAZINE

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Kaelin: Yeah, that’s... Yeah. But anyways, and then just grew Lady Boss on the back of the fact that we truly just wanted to make an impact on other women’s lives who were just like me, who felt hopeless and they didn’t know where to start or what to do. We just brought that information to the marketplace in a real and truthful manner, which you don’t hear from most weight loss companies.

Brandon: And you know connected with ClickFunnels with Russell Brunson, who’s now just a dear friend of ours, and he’s helped us a lot along the way. We use his software.

We’re super plugged in with them and yeah, man, it’s been a journey.

A lot of different directions we could go, I guess.

Hawk: Alright, man. Thank you both. In terms of, and you guys have done a ton, and I remember hearing you guys speak at Funnel Hacking Live. I think this was two years ago now. Where you were talking about when you picked up the book and you literally went step by step by step through it. Can you talk about the determination and what was the mindset you had to have in order to pick up the book and, not just read it as most people do, but actually implement it on the spot.

Brandon: I think that’s one of the problems, if you will, in the entrepreneurial world right now is there’s so much information and everyone’s listening to everything and trying to consume as much as

they can but there’s this massive lack of execution and focus, right? So I think the first thing people gotta do is they need to select one voice that they’re gonna listen to and in selecting that voice, I would pick someone who has done what you wanna do so you can do what they do to get what they’ve got, right, and then just focus in on that. For us, it was Russell. We wanted to have an online membership, we wanted to create a direct response marketing company to help women and so we bought his program, sat down and we treated it like... We spent $160000 like you would a college and that’s how we studied and we implemented it. We didn’t go on to the next lesson until we implemented, right?

before we finish and were able to move on to the next thing. I was dying the whole time. I was like, oh my gosh, I really had to stop to see what Brandon was doing and I was like, wow, this is genius. We’re literally building... We literally built the whole thing by the time that we were done with the course, the book and that’s what made it really cool was because at the end instead of just being like, okay what do we do now? I just consumed all this information where do I start? It’s like, we already started through the whole process and at the end, we had built what we needed to enable to launch our company right then.

Hawk: That’s so powerful. We already talked about company size and revenue. What would you Kaelin: There was literally like build attribute your success and being this email sequence and we were able to scale to 32 million dollars a gonna be like, okay we have to stop year in just four years? and build the whole sequence and Brandon: Oh man, there’s a lot of literally would go for days, maybe,

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things. I think one of the major shifts and we talked about this in our Forbes article, was understanding that you can’t do it alone. I mean, the first thing that you need to do is consistently produce revenue and sales, right? You have to be able to create a consistent stream, whether that’s connecting your Facebook ads to your funnel and knowing your numbers and being able to create consistent revenue and then from there it’s like, okay if you wanna really grow past the laptop lifestyle, solo, entrepreneur... Which was hard for us cause we lived that for six months and we didn’t work a whole lot.

Kaelin: We retired.

Brandon: We actually retired, right?

We always say that “Yeah, we retired in our 20s.”

Kaelin: We moved to a beach and retired.

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Brandon: We moved to a beach and didn’t do a whole lot and honestly it was so boring. We had to make that transition. Do we wanna be just laptop funnel people or do we wanna have a real company, right? So in that transition is where you make a decision that you can’t do it alone, you have to build a team, you have to create leverage and there are people out there that are way better than you at certain things and letting go and equipping people. There’s a lot of leadership that I think goes into that scale, right? I think that’s probably the biggest thing if I had to pick one.

beach and sunshine that you can were judging them or whatever, we handle before you’re like, wait a weren’t fair and all of this. We’ve second. had the wage division come in and look at back wages because people Kaelin: Yeah. are truly insane and it’s tough as Hawk: Yup. So what are some of an entrepreneur once you start to the challenges or adversities that build a team and you hire people, you guys have faced that after going you have to get them trust. That’s through them you were able to take why it’s so important to really have them, use them as a learning lesson a great process to vet people. So to actually scale your business? we’ve dealt with that. We’ve had merchant accounts get shut down.

Brandon: Oh my gosh.

We’ve hadKaelin: Whoo, we actually just Kaelin: Multiple times. wrote out a whole list of these.

Brandon: We’ve had our entire Brandon: We just did a presentation program go down, no one could to a high-level group on this and the access to it. stuff that we’ve overcome Kaelin: For two weeks.

Kaelin: Yeah, I feel like most people see our company, they see us and Brandon: Two weeks we’vethey’re like, oh yeah, Lady Boss.

Overnight success company, doing Kaelin: We had $60000 stolen all this stuff. I’m like, no you guys from us from a supplement have no idea all the stuff that we’ve manufacturer. been through, all the adversity Brandon: Yeah, we’ve got an open we’ve been through to build what lawsuit. We’re suing a company right we have. The cool part is we’re now. I mean, there’s just like... You neither people that really focus on could go on and about the trials and the crap that we have to go through tribulations of growing a company to get to where we wanna go. All but at the end of the day, I think the stuff that comes at us, we kind what I really learned in presenting of just deal with it and move on and that whole thing to that group that we don’t make a big deal about it we were just kind of talking about is and sulk on it but you can tell him a that we don’t ever focus on it. It’s just couple specific ones. we take it in stride and It feels like Brandon: Yeah, after I finished... I you get punched in the gut but then could literally write a book on this, in that same moment you just have I feel like. After I did that, I was so to go, okay, what can we do. Let’s uncomfortable talking about all focus on a solution and let’s figure these trials and tribulations that we it out. I think that’s been you know...

Kaelin: Yeah, I think it comes hand in hand. The other thing, I think, is the other half to that, is always putting your customer first. I feel like most people don’t put their customers first. They’re just like, oh I wanna sell something and sell it and never talk to these people again and we truly put our customers first. They are most important. Everything we do in this company we ask them. We survey them. We put them first. We talk about them every morning. We read our mission statement every morning as a company. Really focusing on who we’re helping and why we’re helping them and I think just keeping that in the forefront all the time that the people that you serve are real people. And this company is built off changing women’s lives and I think having that as a focal point and also scaling by asking for help. Those are the two magic pieces I think that had been through because when most people shy away from. they come, I never really focus on Hawk: That is awesome. I loved them, it’s more just like, okay what when you guys retired. I think it’s do we need to do now? every entrepreneur’s dream to retire. Kaelin: How do we solve it?

I remember when I retired for six months and it has gotten very boring Brandon: How do we solve it and very fast. There’s only so much you where do we go forward, but I mean, we’ve had crazy HR claims, can do. people that were just out to basically Brandon: There’s only so much extort the company, say that we VOLUME 3 * FUNNEL MAGAZINE

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Kaelin: Yeah, and one of the cool things here at Lady Boss, we have this mentality here and all of our team here has a mentality of what problem are we gonna fix and solve today? It’s not we think we’re living in this realm of, oh, nothing bad’s ever gonna happen and then something bad happens and we’re like, taken out by it. It’s like what problems are we gonna fix and are

we gonna solve today? So when stuff comes up we’re just like, how do we solve it? That’s everyone reaction and Brandon’s done a really good job of kind of instilling that into the whole team because that’s exactly what he’s done with all these huge mountains we’ve had overcome.

Brandon: Yeah, the only perfect companies areKaelin: Dead.

Brandon: Out of business. You know what I mean? So I think that’s a mentality you have to have.

Hawk: You guys, you’ve had a lot of experience building a team here in the US. Have you guys ever outsourced any of it outside of the US so you don’t have to deal with some of those challenges or is it all US based?

Brandon: I’d say about 95% of our team is US based. We do outsource a few things, but I think for the most part, and again, contrary to the popular belief systems and paying people less in other countries, is when you create that kind of distance, and you don’t actually have real employees, you lose the edges, right? People will give their discretionary time because they’re passionate because they’re all in on one thing. You lose the culture of that you develop with people.

We have a 10000 square foot office in Albuquerque, where our main operations is out of, and if we weren’t all in the same place if weren’t together we wouldn’t be able to harness that energy and build that momentum and culture and relationships and the things that really create a strong team. In my experience, its taken two to three contractors to replace one full time employee and so that’s kind of been our philosophy is like, yeah we can pay someone in the Philippines $4 an hour to do customer service but

what kind of service is that customer gonna get and at the end of the day, for thinking about the customer and you wanna have a long-term relationship with them. Where’s the tradeoff? You know what I mean?

So that’s kind of the philosophy we’ve adopted.

Hawk: I love it. There’s obviously delegating tasks and then there’s the automation side, which includes funnels, Facebook, all that sort of stuff. What percentage of

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your business of you say you’ve automated versus delegated out?

Brandon: I think we try to automate everything that we can and then everything else becomes human resources, right? You pretty quickly reach a point where you can automate emails and you can automate... I mean to a point you can automate advertising. It does much better with people behind it, but I think we automate what we can and we create efficiencies with EDITION 1 FUNNELMAGAZINE.COM

software and technology where we can. I think at this point there’s only so much you can do that with and having great people, I think they’re the ultimate resource, to be honest with you. I think there lots of technology, some’s great, some’s not, some stuff you can do manually that you can do automatic but ultimately when you have good people, when you have people that are competent and have character and are committed to what you’re doing, I think that’s the ultimate resource at this level. When you look at Fortune 500 companies, when you look at big companies, they’re built on amazing talent.

one of the customer service tools that we use. This has shaved hours off of our customer service time. So really, I think most of our stuff is ...

Brandon: Yeah, it’s probably referral based. We definitely look for things and the team is always looking.

And when we find a technology, a lot of times our leaders will present it to us, and be like, “Hey, I found this software, I think it could be cool.” And we’ll look at it. But man, it’s hard because there’s so much software out there. And you’ve got to be careful what you adopt, right?

And the bigger you become, the bigger these moves make and the more costly they are, and the more I was reading a letter from Elon return you’ll get. So you just kind of that he sent to all of his team about really evaluate. some promotions and people that I would say probably referrals is have raised up and you could see the biggest one. When you’ve got just the talent that he had on his ... And that’s where the power in team and the people that he had the network that you have and the recruited from other companies and people that you know. Because the anyways, so at that level I think it’s stuff that they’re using, you can definitely a human resource game already see and have a real kind of but there’s... when you can automate feedback on it. stuff with funnels and emails and you really take advantage of that, Hawk: Absolutely. So you guys I think to create that sales pipeline primarily have your primary funnel. is probably the biggest thing in And what do you guys use to drive automation for us. traffic? What is the best source of traffic that you guys have found for Hawk: What do you guys look for your business? when you’re trying to find a new piece of automation or a new tool Brandon: Yeah, that’s a great to automate something, that you question. I think Facebook has see could be automated, but isn’t always been our number one traffic currently? source. We’re really branching a lot out onto Google now. And it’s Kaelin: I think we just look at what starting to really grow. Our organic other people tell us that What to has increased a lot. Just as our brand do for like, hey I’m using this that’s has grown. We utilize Amazon as really helped us X, Y, Z and they’re well. And yeah, I think those are like, does that fit for is or doesn’t it. the main big ones. And we focus on I don’t think we really actively go building our lists. Manychat, email try to find it all the time. It usually lists, definitely email lists, number comes to us by referral. Like, hey one. But, yeah.

Russell will be like, hey, you guys need to use this or other of our Hawk: What is the front end offer friends in this space will be like, hey you guys have that you find is this has really shaved off hours like converting best for you guys?

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Brandon: We have a seven day free experienced to our program that we offer. And that’s been a really good one. Seven day free trials, if you look at iTunes and Prime and all the big companies. That’s a tried and true kind of offer. We also just go straight to the product themselves.

So we sell our supplemental lines straight to the product page. So it just depends.

And that’s what’s funny, I think people think that funnels are like, “Oh if I just get this offer or this price point or whatever, I’m going to have success.” But at the end of the day, it’s where the traffic comes from, how they get warmed up, it’s the story that’s told, right? It’s like, we’ve had a million people go and try to knock off what we’re doing. It would blow your mind, it would literally blow your mind ...

Kaelin: We send cease and desists every other day.

Brandon: It would blow your mind how much of that we have going on. But at the end of the day, I think understanding your customer’s pains and their dreams, and crafting a message and creating a journey for them to go through. And then having, of course, a good offer that can get them in the door. But that’s kind of been a staple for us right now. We like the seven days and we also have it just straight to our products.

Hawk: Awesome. So somebody goes into your seven days, what’s the value ladder? I’m really curious as to how you’re generating $32 million a year on a pretty low-end offer. I think, if I recall correctly, it was like $149 for the year, they pay yearly? Right? So you guys are scaling fast. You’re growing pretty fast. How are you guys bringing people up the value ladder for you guys?

trial. And then they’re ascending up to your coaching program. What are they investing at?

Brandon: So the coaching program is $4,999 for the year. So we’re just instituting that price increase. And they can pay $497 a month. And it’s a 12-month commitment. So we have a phone team and basically, people apply and they get on the phone and that’s how we ascend them into that top tier. Because for us, it’s like ... It’s a lot of work to put together a phone team, sales processes, scripts, commission plans, all the things that come along with that. And then to have coaching, so we have a very serious process of vetting and onboarding coaches.

We get about 250 coaching applications ... 250 people that apply to be a health coach for Lady Boss every single month. And so for us, it’s a filtration process. And then we put them through a two-week certification. And then we ultimately connect that customer with them.

So that’s kind of like the upper end.

Brandon: Yeah, great question, man. We use email sequences. So we tell the story that Kaelin’s had.

And we tell the story of Lady Boss and why they should care. And help them have that identity shift that Kaelin teaches a lot on. And they come in with a free offer that we give them. And we always push to get them on monthly, our plans, the Lady Boss lifestyle. And then from there, we have supplements and we love to get them on a club membership as well. And help them get continuity with our physical products as well. And then we send people to upgrade and get an unlimited access pass to the Lady

Boss lifestyle. And kind of lock them in and from there we have a coaching program. So that’s kind of like our ascension. And we also sell merchandise on the back end.

So just clothing to help them feel empowered and swag, as we call it.

We do launches of swag. So that’s kind of some of the back end stuff.

We’re also in a very big market.

The weight loss market is a very big market. There’s a lot of people, so that definitely helps when you’re talking about a lower ticket.

And for us, it’s like we love that program because that’s where people get the most results. Because they’re the most invested. Your heart follows where you put your treasure. And so, if you’re investing in that high tier, and you’ve got a coach, you’ve got that ultimate level of accountability, and you’ve got coaches that really care, that’s where we can help them the most.

So we love that program. It’s a lot of fun.

Hawk: Awesome. As you guys know, and you talked a little bit about this before, the fortune is in following up and getting their own calls. So what are some of the things that you guys do other than email to follow up with your prospects?

Hawk: Absolutely. How much is Brandon: We do a lot of retargeting. your coaching program? So they’re coming in on this free seven-day Kaelin: Yeah.

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Brandon: We do a lot of retargeting. Brandon: Yeah, 100%. When We do a lot of email follow up. you talk about a customer and cultivating and creating more Kaelin: We do a lot of cultivating in than just a transaction, but a real our community too. customer, I think the community is Brandon: We do a lot of that, absolutely huge. So we text, we do emails. We call, community. We exactly. pretty much do everything we can Kaelin: We only have a paid group. to get in front of the customer, you So everyone that’s inside the know?

Lady Boss community is a paying Very cool. Just out of customer. So you’re cultivating Hawk: curiosity, do you guys use voicemail them there, just building belief. And they’re seeing results. And they’re drops and slide broadcasts to follow like, “Wow, I want to upgrade up with people through voicemail? from being on a seven day trial to Brandon: Yeah, totally. We do one. being a full customer. I can do this.”

And we tell them it’s recorded.

Because they can see the results We don’t pretend like we’re a real everyone else is getting. And so person and we left them a voicemail.

I feel like a lot of it is cultivated in Because honestly, I think people our community by other women, miss out a lot because they don’t and not necessarily even by us. It’s market and sell on the premise that just them seeing actual results from their customer is intelligent and they other women. They are like, “Wow, understand what’s going on. this is the real deal. I really want to stick with this and do this.”

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you’re doing. Newsflash!

Brandon: And so we do use one. We actually recorded it with the whole team and we invited them into the community with a voicemail. And so it’s like, “Hey, we want to welcome you to Lady Boss. We’re recording this right now. We’re in our whole company huddle.” And we had everyone scream.

Kaelin: Say hi, and they’re all like, “Hi!” Brandon: It’s really cool.

Kaelin: It’s so awesome.

Brandon: And we invite them into the community with that. But that’s the only voicemail drop that we use. Because also, you’ve got to really respect their space. You start bombarding people and their voicemail and their text messages all the time ... We only send like one or two texts total.

Kaelin: Yeah.

Brandon: I think about what I would want. I think a lot of times we think, we’ve got to bomb them. But then I think about what I would want.

When I get texts from ...

Kaelin: Or you think about what you don’t want.

Brandon: Yeah, right.

Kaelin: What I don’t want is people texting my phone.

Brandon: Yeah, so we try to respect that. But we utilize it for sure and just be tactful about it.

Kaelin: Yeah. We just kind of think of as myself as a consumer, what do I like and not like in the marketplace right now? And I feel like one of the things I don’t like is all the calls that I get all the time. And text messages, I’m like, “Where did this even come from?” So we just try to be aware of the things that we feel in the marketplace and just duplicate that with our customers so they can have a good experience.

Hawk: Awesome. You guys talked a lot about the culture. Can you share more about the culture and what you guys help them stand for? I guess you talked about your manifesto as well.

“I’m stepping into become a Lady thing that if somebody was working their business and working on their Boss now.” funnels ... And I’d like for each of The excuses that I used to make, you guys to share something. What I’m not going to make any more. would be one thing that they could And they have a manifesto where implement today, either in their it’s like, “I am confident. I am business or in their life, to make their amazing. I take action. I make no life and business better? And be excuses. I kick butt. I’m unstoppable. implementable today. So like within I’m a Lady Boss.” And they read the next hour or two. this to themselves and they are in agreement and committing to that Brandon: I know mine. as their identity. So it truly shifts their Kaelin: Go ahead. entire mindset. How they see our plan, how they see our programs, Brandon: So the one thing I would that they can do it. And really just tell them is, get in alignment. stopping a lot of negative self-talk Kaelin: That was mine! that women have. And helping them believe that, “Now I have Brandon: Was that yours? this plan. Now I believe I can do it. I believe that I can accomplish Kaelin: Yes, I swear. It’s alignment. these things.” And with our culture, Brandon: So whether you’re married it’s a culture of where women can or not, you do it with yourself if you’re actually empower each other and not. If you have a business partner, lift each other up. you do it with your business partner.

Instead of ... On the outside world, If you’re married, you do it with your it feels like women are catty with spouse. If you don’t, you just do each other or dragging each other it alone. But getting in alignment down or talking about each other is number one. I need to pull our or gossiping. I’m like, “None of that document. We do it every day.

is allowed here. We are going to support each other.” We have such firm standards, high standards that we hold in our community that it just raises everyone up to become the best version of themselves. Which Kaelin: Yeah, so I think this is the makes us different. one thing that sets Lady Boss apart Hawk: That is definitely something from other weight loss companies. unique. We just had a daughter and Everyone else looks like a “plan” out have been trying to find groups, not there. There are a million companies only for myself but for my wife. And with our model, right? Help women I love that you guys have created a losing weight, give them plans, culture that people aren’t pushing workouts. Help them get active, each other down. And it’s that they that type of thing. But the thing that are lifting each other up. That’s makes us different is we truly give something that the world needs and them this identity shift when they is one of the reasons why you guys come in. We change who they are have so many awards on the back as a person and their belief about there. themselves. And so when they come in, the community and the culture Kaelin: Yeah, that’s it. that you’re talking about, it’s like, Hawk: So if you could share one VOLUME 3 * FUNNEL MAGAZINE

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So every single morning, Kaelin and I at the same time, we get in alignment. What that means is, number one, we talk about what did we do yesterday? What did we get done yesterday? And taking the few minutes to plan your day, the 15 minutes to plan your week. And an hour to plan your month. And a couple of hours to plan your quarter and the day to plan your year is absolutely a game changer.

So like the alignment is the execution of that at the micro level. So what did we do yesterday? And then the next thing is, what are we going to do today? And for us, we have a planning system where we put, here are the top five things that we’re doing today. And we pull those from what we call our airlock. Which is where we put all action items,

period. So I could pull my airlock right now and show the next year of what the company is going to do.

Because I saved every little good idea that I want to execute, right?

So planning your day. Number one, what did we do yesterday?

Number two, what are we going to do today? And we both get in alignment on what we did and what we’re going to do. And as a married couple, it’s huge, because you get into little fights here and there about whatever. Who’s dropping what and who’s taking what car or whatever. And as business partners, a lot of times we just kind of just go and wander off. We have no idea what each other is doing, what our focus is. So we get in alignment.

The next thing we do is look at our calendar together.

whatever it may be. And then the last thing that we do is we pray together and then we crush it off into our day.

that it has, especially if you’re an entrepreneur, then I think that you’re really missing out. Your energy levels, your focus, your mind and just So just getting in alignment with drinking water. We sell these jugs to your business partner, with yourself. our customers because it’s got a And taking that minute to plan your straw. Andday, look at what you’re doing, ask Kaelin: It’s a half gallon. those questions ... Is absolutely a Brandon: I’m chugging this thing game changer. down all day long, right? And Kaelin: And take those five minutes. working out in the morning. I’ve got It’s five minutes. a trampoline in here like right here on the side, you can’t see it, but I Brandon: So that’s mine. jump on that thing every hour just Kaelin: That WAS mine. I’m like to keep my body, keep myself in kind of mad. shape, and so that’s another big one that you could do right now.

Hawk: At least you guys are in You said it had to be right now, I’m alignment. like, “Go jump up and down.”

Kaelin: Yes, I know!

Hawk: Out of curiosity, you guys Brandon: That’s right! have an affiliate program?

Kaelin: We say where we are Kaelin: It is, seriously, especially as a uncomfortable. couple. We’re literally together 24/7.

Brandon: And then the thing after Literally together 24/7. They’re like, that is, we ask the question, “Where “How do you all do it?” Literally were you uncomfortable yesterday?” together 24/7. They’re like, “How do And so that gives us the ability you all do it? How do you manage to ... Whatever is in our personal to make that happen, and still be relationship. If it was something married, and still be a couple?” in business or something we were And I think that’s the biggest thing, uncomfortable with. Because a is getting in alignment with each lot of times, as entrepreneurs, we other. For sure, that’s changed our tolerate too much. And we wait last year like bar none. All the issues until an explosion before we really we were having in our business was deal with stuff, because we’re so because we weren’t aligned as a busy or whatever. And so, we ask couple. We were both trying to that question, “Where were you shoulder so much stuff, and putting that five minutes into our morning, uncomfortable?” every morning, has completely The next thing we ask is, “Where can changed our marriage and our I support you today?” So we get to business. find out how we can support each other. So you can see, even if you’re Brandon: Yeah, and I want to say doing it yourself, looking at, “Where another one since it was kind of the was I uncomfortable yesterday? same thing. The other thing that I Where do I need to redirect or find would say is just physically if you’re support for myself in this thing?” Or not treating your body like it’s a find someone who’s maybe better million dollar racehorse ... andat doing copy, because I don’t like Kaelin: Because it is. it. Or someone who’s better at doing this kind of thing in my business, Brandon: That’s the capacity

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Brandon: Yeah we do.

Kaelin: All of our digital and all of our other products.

Brandon: Yeah, I think we paid out probably like almost a little bit over 100,000 in commissions last month so people are doing really well. We have a lot of continuity programs that do really well and we pay out unlimited on those with a physical product. Kind of cool. A little shameless plug there since you asked.

Hawk: Speaking of an affiliate program, how did you guys build your affiliate program? What was the mindset? How’d you build that out?

Brandon: Yeah, totally, good question. Do you want to get this one?

Kaelin: No, go ahead.

Brandon: I think the first thing is for me as the CEO I don’t have the capacity to run all the different things going on. I think if someone’s EDITION 1 FUNNELMAGAZINE.COM

starting, it’s an excellent place to start though if it’s just like you and you’re solo or you’ve got like one or two team members. But the mindset is just looking for who are people that they’re following that you can help. It’s not like, “Oh, I need to go get people who will sell my stuff.”

It’s like, whose audience can I really serve? Coming from that angle is gonna really attract people because there are two things that people care about when you’re trying to get an affiliate. Someone who’s an affiliate marketer, think about like number one, they’re like, “Will it help my audience? Will it actually help?” People who have a real audience, not people who say they do, people who actually have a real following and real influence, that’s the first thing they’ll want to know is will it actually help my people? The second thing is will it make money?

I think to focus on people that you can really help and then the second thing is making sure do you have a lucrative program. I’m always ... for us, we always took the mindset stance of will it be absolutely lucrative up front? A good friend of mine said, “Is it an offer that they will get out of bed in the middle of the night and drive 30 minutes to go get? If it’s not then it’s not good enough.” So for us it was we offer recurring commissions on supplements and there’s literally nobody in the supplement industry that does that at a high level. They offer like generous up front but then after that, they don’t offer reoccurring. For us, it’s like 30% all the way down the line. You know what I mean? On physical products.

That’s just an example of what the offer would be.

you should definitely get. He’s a Brandon: Yeah. really good friend of ours and he’s Kaelin: Exactly. got a great system.

Brandon: Yep. Kaelin: He’s the master.

Hawk: That’s awesome.

Brandon: He explains it in amazing ways. Talks aboutBrandon: Yep, and then we-

Kaelin: We just did what Dana says. Brandon: We found a great affiliate manager, found someone that we Hawk: That’s high.

Brandon: Yeah, there you go. trust that could represent us and Brandon: Dana Derricks has a book Hawk: You guys just went through gave him all the materials, plugged called “Dream 100” that if you look the book and spent six weeks going him in, coached along the way and into building an affiliate program through each and every single ... yeah, that’s totally been it, man. It’s VOLUME 3 * FUNNEL MAGAZINE

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been fun. It’s been cool. It’s never who you think it’s gonna be with affiliates, you know. You find these people ... and it’s sad too because a lot of people who run affiliate programs they don’t do what they say they’re gonna do. They promise things, they pay commissions late. It will blow your mind at a high level what kind of companies do stuff like that. They come to us and they get a breath of fresh air. I think ... that’s just an integrity thing I would say across the board. Yeah.

Hawk: That’s awesome guys. Do you guys have any other wisdom and insights that you can share with the audience? Whether it’s in business, in weight loss, in life?

Brandon: What you got, Kaelin?

Kaelin: I’m just thinking.

Brandon: Drop one on them. She’s preparing for our live event.

Kaelin: I honestly think it’s being authentic and I just see so many other people that are the me elsewhere, that are like the face and stuff and you meet them in person and they’re not really who they are online and that type of thing and it almost makes you sad. I just ... I know if you’re just authentic and be who you are and build your business around you being able to be who you are. So for me, everyone in this company ... every one of our Lady Bosses knows I love God, knows I love guns, knows I’m weird and that I’m quirky and I just get to be myself. If I go to my group and pray for people or go shooting and show me shooting guns, I don’t have people coming at me, because my community knows who I am.

I just believe building your business and being 100% authentic to who you are and knowing that you don’t have to hide those things, you don’t have to look perfect, you don’t have to be perfect all the time, you can

just be you and when you do that, the people that are like you will flock to you and now all of our customers are all of my favorite people, because we share like interests. I see so many people trying to capture everyone and try to get everyone to love them and try to please everyone and then they end up with nothing because they’re too broad.

set it up is super important. The way that you set things up, and it’s crazy because as we’ve scaled, I’ve been thankful about the time that we spent and the way we’ve set things up, the way we’ve structured our time, the way we’ve structured our offers, the way we’ve structured our belief systems and the things that we talk about, because it’s hard to be authentic if things are always I’m very polar. I am who I am, I’m crossing, and so just thinking about gonna say what I say, and that’s that you get to make the game and how we built this business. We just ... ... for those of you out there that are building your own business, be who Kaelin: And that your business is you are and don’t be afraid of it. here to serve people.

Be weird and be quirky and have your favorite things that you like to Brandon: Oh, that’s another one. do and don’t be ashamed of those That’s what I wanted to say. That’s things and don’t ever step down part of making the game is that from them, because your sheep will as an entrepreneur, I think that know your voice and they will come we forget that we created our to you and your customers will be company to serve us, not the other exactly who you want to work with way around, and ultimately if you instead of people that you’ll feel are create a ... I know a lot of people, always judging you or against you I have friends that have created or against what you’re doing. That multiple seven figure businesses that would be my biggest advice. Yours? they hated. They’re like miserable running it and you’re like, “What are Brandon: BOOM! I gotta go you doing it for?” You know what too? I gotta follow that?

I mean? So when you make the game and when you create your Kaelin: Yeah. business keeping that in mind.

Brandon: Dang. Well, Hawk, that’s Kaelin: You don’t have to do a great question. I would say ... he’s anything was something profound like, talk about all these areas man. you said to me, like, there was ... I I could dive into anything. didn’t want to do one on one calls Kaelin: I know. That’s what I was because we had done so many like, “It’s so broad.” network marketing. Brandon was like, “Well, you don’t have to do Brandon: I know, he’s like, “What is anything. We can build this however the thing?” What’s been on my mind we want. The business is here to lately is a friend of mine said this to serve us, not for you to serve the me once, he said that there’s those business.” I was like, “Wow. That’s who play the game and then there’s profound.” those who make the game.

Brandon: Yeah.

Kaelin: Ooh. Kaelin: That’s helped a lot of people Brandon: I love that because when you told them that. ultimately as an entrepreneur you get to make the game that you’re Brandon: Yeah. gonna play in and that others are Hawk: That’s a really good little gonna play in and the way that you

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drop of gold there. We all know it.

Kaelin: My husband has a lot of those.

Brandon: Sprinkling it around.

women in person. Me and then all of our team. We all get to go and really see the impact that we’re making, the direct impact we’re making in their lives and it’s just ... it’s awesome to look at and see all the faces and think, “Wow. Changing all these faces, and their families and their family trees that are affected by what these women do with us,” it’s just the best thing ever.

Hawk: You have a lot of quotables just so you know. I keep hearing things and I’m like, “Wow. We can use those as quotes.” You kind of mentioned something in passing, which you said you have an event.

Tell me what’s your event about?

What do you guys ... what’s the Hawk: Are you guys also gonna have Lindsey Stirling performing? purpose and the design of it?

Kaelin: Yeah, it’s the LadyBoss Live your breakthrough awaits is actually October of this year, the first week of October. It’s like next week. It’s super exciting. A thousand women coming into Nashville, Tennessee and it’s just for us it’s like a big event for these women to get together and meet each other because everything we do is online. We’re a virtual weight loss company and so they get to meet each other in person for the first time and we have a ton of good speakers, great speakers, actually, coming in to really just help these women have a breakthrough in different areas of their life, in relationships, in their weight loss, in their mentality, in their confidence, and just creating these breakthroughs for these women because if you can think at every point in our life, how did we make a shift and start going in a different direction where we started to change things? It was always with some type of breakthrough.

For me, it was my grandma smacking my hand and telling me that I didn’t need another cookie.

That was my breakthrough moment.

It was like, “Oh my gosh. She’s so right. A-ha.” Just helping all of these women have that, have that moment for them and just to help amp them up and get them fired up. Also, my favorite part about it is that we get to meet all of these VOLUME 3 * FUNNEL MAGAZINE

Kaelin: We could have done like 2000, 2500 this year, but, oh well.

Hawk: It’s good to keep your community hungry for it, so ...

Awesome. Well, I appreciate you guys for being on and sharing. Do you guys have anything else that you wanted to share before we jump off?

Brandon: No, man. I think you covered it. Great questions.

Kaelin: Yeah.

Kaelin: No.

Brandon: Hopefully it sticks with some people.

Hawk: I was gonna say I’ll buy a ticket right now.

Kaelin: Hopefully it helps.

Kaelin: Just so you know, we had Nashville before Clickfunnels, Russell copied us, just saying. I will go on record with that.

Brandon: The biggest thing is just if you’re listening to this right now and you heard something that applies to you, just go make me proud and execute it. Go do it.

Hawk: I literally bought the ticket. I didn’t even get down the page and I’m just like, click. I saw Lindsey Stirling. I’m like, “I’m in.” I don’t even know what the rest of the thing is.

I’m good.

Kaelin: You just have to remember, it’s not our name, it’s not our value ladder, it’s about our products.

It’s literally just that we freaking execute more than anyone else does. That’s it. That’s the answer.

Kaelin: We are having a cover band there. We’re doing a concert on Saturday night and we’re having a cover band so that should be really fun.

Hawk: Awesome. I appreciate you guys. Thank you so much. Have a blessed day.

Kaelin: No. We did one last year.

We had 400 there last year.

Hawk: Awesome guys. You guys have heard from two of the most brilliant marketers and game changers and life changers on this planet, especially in the health and fitness arena. You guys need to learn more about them. Go check them out online. If you’re a lady, go become a LadyBoss.

Also, if you want to subscribe to funnel magazine and get access to everything for life, go to funnelmagazine.com/lifetime.

Thank you guys, and have a blessed day.

Hawk: Nice. How many do you guys have this year?

Kaelin: A thousand.

Hawk: Nice. That’s a good jump.

Kaelin: Heck yeah.

Brandon: It is. Our hotel is too small.

Kaelin: Yeah.

Brandon: We sold out in 12 hours.

We should have gotten a bigger hotel, but it worked out.

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Brandon: Thanks.

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I Have Thousands of Visitors to My Website Every Month…

So, Are You Converting them into Sales?

As a marketer, there is a lot of data available and it can be overwhelming knowing what to look at and what metrics are needed to determine a successful marketing activity. You need to learn which metrics to focus on because some metrics don’t really matter. You can end up spending all your time pulling reports from different analytics platforms and then sifting through a vast amount of data to realize you didn’t get the answer you needed. If this is you, then keep reading.

Data results only matter if you can prove them. You won’t be able to grow your business if the metrics you track don’t help you make the right decisions. The data you need to track depends on your priorities but here are a few major metrics you may like to monitor on a recurring basis.

Website Metrics

ARTICLE BY David Kraus

Bounce rate: A bounce happens when people land on your home page and immediately leave. If there is a high percentage of bounces you want to consider switching up your design in order to get people to click around a bit more. To measure your bounce rate, you can use https://www.google.com/analytics/ Session duration: How long are visitors spending on a site? Are they looking at multiple pages or reading content across the site? There are several tools out there such as Toggl https://toggl.com/ which have free trials to begin tracking your visitor’s duration.

Highest trafficked page: Which pages(s) are your visiting spending the most time on? The amount of time spent on a page indicates how engaging your content is and how relevant the audience may be. This can also be tracked inside of https://www.google.com/ analytics/

Where’s your traffic coming from This can tell you a Site speed: Site speed impacts user experience, SEO, lot. For instance, where to advertise, what backlinks are conversions, engagement, and more so monitoring this working and if your social media marketing is working. metric regularly is vital. Issues with site speed can come It’s really not about how many visitors you have but down to a single simple fix or it may indicate rather how many visitors engage you. I would rather a wide range of issues. A good place to have 1,000 very engaged visitors than 1,000,000 measure your website speed for free visitors. The reason is visitors cost you money one way is at tools.pingdom.com/ or another, so engagement is the name of the game.

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your acquisition cost is, you can determine where to invest your time and money to scale No matter what you hear, social media is still very your sales. undervalued for the return on your investment. Why? • Qualified leads: Sometimes I hear people The targeting you are capable to generate in social bragging about how many leads they are media is still better than any other game in town. So, generating and my question is always the same. whether your investment is in time or in money, social How qualified are these leads? The best way to media should be a priority. Metrics you should measure determine the answer is the closing rate. If that are: rate is low then I would speculate many of the leads weren’t qualified, to begin with. Need your • Followers leads to be more qualified? You will need to • Reach implement a filter system such as questionnaires • Impressions or extra steps to weed out the tire kickers.

• Engagement: Metrics like social shares indicate • Conversion rate: This is a BIGGIE! How good engagement but research shows that people is your marketing efforts at getting people often share something without reading it. interested in your product, service, or solution?

Comments are a more reliable indicator of What is your visitor-to-lead conversion rate? quality engagement. It’s likely a person will only • Click-through-rate: CTR is a common metric comment if they’ve read your content and feel through search, social, and email. How do you strongly about it. improve click-through rates? Try A/B testing different email subject lines, title tags, or social Email Marketing Metrics posts. Optimizely https://www.optimizely.com is • Subscribers a great tool for A/B split testing.

• Open rate • Click-through-rate: Are readers following These are not all of the indicators your business through on your emails call-to-action? How should be monitoring, but it’s a good start! The many clicks through to your offer? biggest secret to using metrics and tracking data is to • Lost contacts (bounces or unsubscribes) determine what is important. What data do you need • Opt-ins: How many sign-ups are you receiving? to collect and analyze to help increase your sales?

Whatever you are offering (your service or Every business needs sales to survive and anything product), is it something the audience wants or we can do to increase the sales is time well spent. needs? Create great content that gets people to sign up for your newsletter (or blog or email list).

Social Metrics

Email Marketing Metrics • Customer acquisition cost: How much does it cost to gain a new lead and ultimately a new customer? In my opinion, this is the most important metric. Once you understand what

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Learn How To Become A Thought Leader in Your Industry, Today Article by Ires Alliston

Did you know becoming a thought leader or an influencer in your industry is both rewarding personally and can also offer a lot of benefits to your business?

However, declaring yourself as a thought leader or industry influencer in your industry today requires work.

Consistent effort and work, nonetheless! Otherwise, it’s like saying, “Hello world, I’m a thought leader but I have little to show for.” Needless to say, no one will take such person seriously.

niche. As a thought leader, providing value on areas that you’re known for and coming up with new ideas, and insights into various aspects of your expertise can certainly achieve such status of being a thought leader.

To be a legit and respected thought leader, you need incredible commitment and focus. It also requires smart strategizing and unwavering effort. Of course, it won’t be easy; however, the reward that comes with being a leader in your industry is far more satisfying than shortterm achievement.

Consider these Steps in Becoming a Thought Leader in Your Industry: 1. Become that expert in your niche

Let’s think about this for a minute, it’s not always necessarily that you need to know everything to become a leader in your industry. It’s a misconception by many people thinking that to be a leader in their industry, they need to know everything and everything well. The good news is that no one truly does, and you also don’t need to either. What matters is that you know the subject well enough, in particular, in your industry to So how does one become a thought leader, like Tim position yourself well at the leader in the marketplace.

Ferris, Seth Godin, Tony Robbins, Karen Gately, Rachel Botsman, Stephen M.R. Covey or Indra You need to understand your niche and position in your Nooyi, you ask? Establish yourself as the go- market. The area of what you’re an expert on should to person in the industry – that expert, be helpful and be valued by your audience such that specialist or the authority in your when they need a solution to a problem related to your niche, you are the person they think of who could provide them the answers they seek. Become that “best thought-leader in the world!”

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So, ask yourself, “What am I truly great at? What is it I do that comes easily to me and can provide a lot of value to others?” Know what you have built your career around and what fulfills you. Also, it’s important to know what you are passionate about more than your peers.

2. Establish your personal brand Whether you’re a freelancer, consultant, or business owner, your personal brand speaks before you do. In other words, your personal brand is about who you are, what you can do to help the people that you intent to serve as well as what you and the company stand for.

Building your personal brand takes time and it doesn’t happen overnight.

While personal brand is the heart and the foundation of your business or company, the other component to this is marketing. Marketing is the extension of personal brands and thought leadership, is an extension of the ability to build a reputation. One way to establish a personal brand is by building, restructuring or improving your social media profiles including Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. By updating your social media profiles with detailed descriptions of your credentials, reviews and career accomplishments, you are showing your credibility, and authority as the thought leader in your industry.

4. Work with influencers and mentors Having an audience that believes in what you’re saying, sharing your passion and excitement on what you do, creating an impact in their lives, providing answers to their problems and appreciating the values of your work speak volume especially to those who follows you.

Once you’ve established a reputation, you need to start reaching out to potential mentors and influencers in your industry. Also, once you have your blog in place, start sharing your information to other social media platforms to build awareness. When your readers learn more about you and know that the information you’re sharing is accurate and dependable, you’ll start gaining their trust and loyalty.

To find influencers and mentors you want to work with, research them online and see if their message and what stand for, aligns with your belief. Once you find influencers and mentors that are willing to work with you, observe them and find out what value you can add for them and their business. Study the way they operate their businesses and read their blogs to learn more.

3. Create your own blog Aside from creating strong social media profiles, it’s also recommended to have a website or blog site and start writing on a regular basis. Nowadays, you can create a simple blog in no time and there are many options to choose from out there. Others have used Wix, or Squarespace but my all-time favorite is WordPress.

WordPress offers not just a blog option, but you can also create beautiful websites. Not to mention, it’s also user-friendly.

Before you go any further, ensure you have an idea of what you want to write about. Establish themes or topics and tie them into your industry. Create a calendar of at least 20-30 topics to get you started. Once you have your topics in mind, write the content and publish them online. It also makes sense to update your blog once a week. Integrate your blogs with your social networks.

You can even share them on groups and community forums, if welcomed.

5. Network, network, and network As many of you know, there is power in networking.

You never know who would be the next connection that makes a significant change in your life! Therefore, it’s highly advisable to continue cultivating relationships with the people you connect with in networking groups, meetings, conference and alike. For thought leaders, networking is and can be that ‘secret sauce’ for getting that next job, for getting that next high-ticket sales or even for getting that next paid speaking gig.

With this, you are laying the foundation because your So how does someone who are just starting blogs show your expertise. Do more research, read out as a thought leader find places to other articles and books to continue writing thoughtprovoking and compelling content on your blog or website.

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network? Be active on social media and reach out to people who are your mentors and influencers. Again, do a bit of research to learn who they are, what current projects they are working on and start up a conversation by connecting with them online and if possible, in person.

Go to events and spark a conversation with them.

Attend meetings in your community and again, reach out to some local leaders in your area. When there are networking events, attend as much as possible and ask for a chance to speak at live events. The more people who know, like and trust you, the better it is for you in the idea behind it, is to understand the relationship positioning yourself as the authority in your market. between the effect (80%) and its cause (20%) to any given situation. In other words, and if applied to 6. Be consistent marketing, 80/20 rule is a concept to come up with If there is one main fundamental lesson that I teach my for solutions for your business. It helps provide a guide students and clients about – it’s about being consistent where one should focus their attention and resources on in your business. It can be a challenged to build a the top 20% of their customers while the 80% should faithful audience if they don’t know who you are. In focus on providing value, content and customer service. relationships, trust comes first, and it takes some work to Now, the 80/20 rule can be applied to almost any do so. Real thought leaders don’t look for a short-term situations both in personal and in the business world success, they are passionate about the industry and – from goal setting, project management, to even always provide quality content. So, to communicate personal development! Anyway, let’s move forward. authenticity, you need to be consistent across all platforms, whether social media, visual platforms like Over-promoting yourself can annoy your audience.

It can harm your brand or business and impact your videos, written publication like magazines or blogs. bottom line. Therefore, you shouldn’t talk about your 7. Leverage how videos can be used company all the time. It makes sense to focus on Nowadays, video content is more demanding. With providing values to your readers by sharing new ideas, the number of people that visit YouTube, Vimeo, educating them and adding helpful tips and strategies Instagram, Periscope and Facebook every day, video when they need your help. content is even more popular these days. Thankfully, Conclusion it’s easier than ever to create your own show as well as create your own video marketing. By utilizing apps like With the above strategies, you can become a thought Animoto, Ripl, Inshot and many others, you can be up leader in your industry by starting today. Just remember, and running in no time. Don’t forget to also upload your it’s a gradual process. Like with many things in life, videos on YouTube, Instagram TV (IGTV) or Vimeo to success takes time. Just like building your brand takes time, becoming a thought leader also doesn’t happen share with your audience. overnight. Unless you have a fair number of followers, So, if your ultimate desire is to become a real thought are already well known in the industry or have partnered leader, it’s necessary to understand how to use and with an influencer, then it’s a different story. Thoughtincorporate video content to your business to speak to leaders are well-informed and they’re the trusted source your audience. The world has become a more video- for many. I hope this is helpful for you. If you like what friendly than ever before; therefore, leverage the power I wrote, follow and spark a conversation on any of my of video and video marketing to your advantage. When social media profiles and podcast. Thanks, and best it comes to video content, make sure you provide value wishes to becoming the BEST and the authority in your relevant to your niche or industry as well as short and field! compelling.

8. Less self-promotion; more value You may have heard of the 80/20 rule or Pareto principle (Italian economist Vilfredo Pareto) before where

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How Strategic Partnerships Can Benefit Your Business Article by Andrew Wallis

Strategic business partnerships can give small busi- with small, enabled me to block time to meet and work nesses such as yours the edge to help them compete with them. with larger companies.

After all, you only have so many hours each day and Imagine reaping the benefits of an asset, product, plenty of things to focus on! expertise or service that you don’t currently have.

On the switch side, I used to have a coaching client who Sounds crazy, right? proudly told me that they had over 30 businesses that they partnered with.

Large companies have been doing it for years. It’s known as a strategic partnership—a mutually beneficial When I asked how often they met each business owner, contractual alliance between two businesses—and it their reply was that they hadn’t since the first meeting. can give small business owners a competitive edge and My next question was how much business had they help them increase the bottom line in innovative ways. generated from each relationship and the answer did It’s a given that bigger companies have more resources not surprise me – no business whatsoever! than smaller businesses. Strategic partnerships can help Building a Strategic Alliance with the right business can you compete effectively with larger firms by leveling be incredibly powerful. But choose the wrong business the playing field. to partner with and you’ll question everything about Continuing our theme of discussing key lead generation why you EVER thought it a good idea to work with a strategies (last month we discussed the power of business owner who ‘just don’t get it’. networking), this month as you might have guessed, we From my experience, when you find a good business are discussing the power of Strategic Alliances. to partner with, it more than makes up all the B.S. you This strategy has been particularly successful for me had to work through. over the years and I believe quality over quantity is the The reason I think more small business owners don’t use key. this fantastic business building strategy is they: I had 3 key Strategic Alliances in my previous • Don’t know any business owners, nor to do they business and I found that keeping the invest the time in reaching out and getting to number of SA Partners I worked know other business owners in groups such as BNI, Toastmasters, and the local Chamber of Commerce.

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• Run into a problem with their SA partner, get frustrated, and ‘give up’ continuing work on this strategy. You must be patient with the process of finding and developing good relationships.

If you are fortunate and develop an ‘instant’ connection that’s great, but most of the time it’s going to take a bit of time to get to know, like, and trust someone. And then even more time to establish a strong working relationship that supports the growth of both your businesses.

• Think they lack time. But that is no excuse, it’s up to you to organize and structure your business in a way that you CAN devote the time it takes to develop strong SA relationships. This involves shifting your mindset from someone who is the technician in their business, to someone who owns and runs a business. It’s the classic battle of you are either working IN your business or working ON your business. Hint: as a business owner, you need to be spending 80% of your time working ON your business if you want to succeed!

• • • • • • • • • • • •

• A business that serves your ideal prospect profile • Has established credibility in your marketplace • Actively markets internally to their customer/ client base (this is a MUST) • Has both online and offline contact information for their customer/client base • Has both a quality relationship with their customer/client base

Here’s your shortcut to success with this system:

Physical Therapist Beauty Salon/Day Spa Natural Foods Store (Whole Foods, etc.)

Exercise Equipment Retailers Massage Therapist Nutrition Store Financial Planner Chiropractor Makeover Specialist/Image Consultant Running store Accountant Specialist Travel Agent (Travel Counsellor)

Where can you get lists and find people to that are candidates for these positions?

• Chamber of commerce directory • BNI directory • Toastmasters and other business networking group relationships • Your own Clients • Don’t forget Google!!

• And of course, your own local knowledge will play a big role here!

So, what makes a good strategic alliance/JV partner?

1. At the bare minimum, I encourage you to join your local chamber of commerce. When you join you’ll get a ‘directory’ of other members (and their business category) in the community.

What makes a BAD strategic alliance/JV partner?

• • • • • •

No database of customers/clients No credibility No money No marketing plan Completely disorganized Doesn’t appreciate or understand the value of marketing/advertising and building win-win reciprocal relationships (i.e. they just don’t get it)

What are some good potential categories?

In a nutshell, it’s any business who serves the same target market as you but is not a direct competitor.

When I had my fitness business, for example, the types of businesses I looked to partner with • Hair Salons • Cosmetic Dentist EDITION 1

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This will become the ‘hit list’ you start working from. 4. Now open up a spreadsheet and create an “SA Each Chamber also matrix” and start filling it up with as many candidates as possible in each category using your Chamber List, has a president and what’s called ‘ambassadors’. These BNI group list, Toastmasters group list, and any other people work for the associations you have. These are your TARGETS. Here chamber members and it’s their job to help introduce is a screenshot of one I used to use… you to other members of the chamber and overall have a positive experience in working with the chamber.

Go to lunch or make an appointment to get together Your column headings should be Sub-group, Business with these folks. They are Name, Address, Website, Email, Phone, Contact influential and will be very helpful in introducing you to Name. the right people, thereby 5. Leverage your existing relationships to book one-to-

‘shortcutting’ your time in meeting the right SA partners. one meetings with each potential SA Partner. Find ones you ‘click’ with and that you can begin working with.

You should also attend the Chamber events, and invest time in meeting the other business owners there. This is 6. Discuss potential marketing opportunities you both called networking. Have fun with it. It’s an investment in can begin with. This is called cross-promotion. The possibilities here are endless, but good first steps are the growth of your business. what are called rather grimly, host/parasite endorsed And remember – it’s not WHAT you know, its WHO direct mail and e-mail campaigns where you write to you know that counts. your list endorsing the other business and presenting SIDE NOTE: Inquire about advertising opportunities their offer to your list (eg “A Special Free Gift For You”) in Chamber publications, like their monthly newsletter and vice versa. and website or email marketing. These are often VERY Or you can look to run a workshop or presentation at

inexpensive media targeted at high impact professionals each other’s place of business. One successful campaign I ran with a hair salon was a Beauty Body Makeover and a good market for your challenge where both the hair salon and I promoted services! my Boot Camp and participants in the challenge had 2. Next, I would encourage you to visit a few local a month of training and the person who achieved the best results over the month won a 3M membership to Business Networking International my sessions and a cut and blow dry (from the salon BNI groups. Find a good chapter with a high number of owner) members that you ‘connect’ with. Take on a leadership role serving in the group. Attend the free training 7. Rinse and repeat until you have at last 3-5 strong SA workshops they have. You can cultivate not only a great partners that you are referral network but also meet SA partners that ‘get it’ running multiple promotions and campaigns with. Get and want to do marketing with you. this right and you will end up with a steady stream of 3. Toastmasters is another organization that you’ll not referrals to your business only learn how to do public speaking from but meet Watch out for our upcoming webinar where we will go other business professionals that are there to do the over a number of sample campaigns to consider. same. Go visit a few in your area and join one you click with (like BNI). Often you’ll not only attract new clients but also find great SA partners in these groups

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Why Freelancers Need a Virtual Private Network ( VPN ) Article by Eric Luis

Most of us have heard about a virtual private network into account the electricity prices along with the VPN at some point... after all its 2018, we at the least know subscription, it’s still cheaper. If your IT department has that they’re great for security along with privacy. organized a VPN from your work PC direct to you, even better!

Except for some reason, you’re not using a VPN? You don’t have time for Netflix, social networking, online Picture waking up in the morning, burning your hand on gaming, or any of these alternative activities that the coffee machine, falling into your vehicle along with conjointly use VPNs. So why would you risk not having your tie in the wrong way, or your makeup still to do. It’s one with your important work? a simple trip, but you soon realize you’re short on gas, which suggests a stop on the way to your workplace.

Virtual Private Network’s (VPN) is reasonably Then you get caught within the traffic, causing your straightforward to use. Working alongside a firewall, arrival to work to be even later. And you forgot to with antivirus/anti-malware protection. Keeping your prepare your tie/makeup. information or data secure along with encrypted, is why you should be using a VPN. It’s alarming. Really, if you can avoid living like that, you should, trust me I am speaking from experience. I Whether or not you’re a freelancer working from a do not miss rushing to work every morning! business office, or taking a couple of days out of your company headquarters to work from home, or even if you work at a desk in a cooperation, you ought to be using a virtual private network.

Here are 5 reasons why anyone working online, but even more so as a freelancer or working from a remote location ought to be using a VPN. 1. It’s Cheaper Than traveling This may surprise you, however using a VPN to connect to your company network is cheaper than traveling. Even once you take

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If performing your work from home is a possibility, by using a virtual private network, you’ll keep your information encrypted remotely thus keep it personal along with being secure. Your work will be shielded from hackers by the VPN’s encryption. All for a couple of bucks a month, bargain!

2. Productivity Is Improved Working from home, or at a table in your favorite restaurant, or perhaps in an exceedingly great looking desk space is really nice, it feels really nice, you feel happier, thus you work harder! As long as you’ve got the determination along with discipline to work instead of play/veg out with Game of Thrones, then you’ll high that you have had to use a Remote Desktop once or twice in the past. expect a huge increase in productivity.

Is it entirely that easy? Well, it takes some effort. As long as RDP is permissible by the organization’s IT However, one factor you don’t wish is to be worrying policy, along with the technical team enabling it, you about is the protection and privacy of your data, work should be able to connect with ease. or assignments. That kind of distraction can cut back productivity, not increase it, not to mention if you are working with some private disclosure agreement then that information could be leaked through not using a virtual private network.

Again, a personal work-arranged virtual private network will be needed here, to keep your data connection to the RDP along with your company information safe.

3. Gain Remote Access to Your Work Network

One of the best things regarding operating as a freelancer is that you can work from just about anyplace.

The most effective place I have found on my travels is a restaurant. Bars are tempting, however, I find they have a larger negative impact on productivity, with louder music alcohol, combined with the party atmosphere thrown into the mix.

It doesn’t matter if you’re coming up with a schedule for your team or developing policies. If your access to the work network is secured by a VPN, nobody is going to be able to remotely hack this information.

But for this to be true, you’re ideally going to want your IT team to make a VPN for you. This secure tunnel would then provide you with the encrypted access you would need to gain access to the very important files held on your home network.

Of course, this all depends on how you’re employed. If you’re a freelancer or virtual assistant, maybe there’s a cooperative portal you often use. Your very important files may well be held within the cloud. Aside all this a VPN can also help to secure VOIP calls, regardless of how you work this is important.

4. Access Your Work Laptop or Computer via RDP While reading this, you’re in all probability wondering “how am I going to connect with my work PC?” It’s quite easy. Using the Remote Desktop Protocol or RDP (several variations are out there, though we’re focusing on the main platform here being Windows ), by using an RDP you’ll establish a remote connection to your work desktop.

If you’re employed in the IT department of a corporation that has an in-house network, the chances are pretty

5. A VPN Protects You on Public Wi-Fi

Need a web connection? No downside. The bulk of cafes supply free wireless networking, thus you’ll be able to get online as you relish your caffe latte and doughnuts. But is it safe?...

Over the years, numerous threats have been found in free Wi-Fi hotspots, I have witnessed these first hand working at my company Best Computer Repair.

Open Wi-Fi networks are renowned for hackers by putting a virus or malware that reports back to the hacker, on somebody’s computer or even in these days more common laptops, tablets, smartphones, even smartwatches!

You most likely don’t fancy losing your username or password to a hacker over an unprotected public connection or in this case wireless hotspot. You might love using public Wi-Fi, however, so do hackers! for this reason along please whatever you do, use a virtual private network.

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Regardless of whether or not the wireless network is public Wrapping up Why Freelancers Need a Virtual Private or not, if it isn’t yours and you don’t have management Network over it, you shouldn’t connect ESPECIALLY while not However you’re operating, full time in the office, using a VPN. a couple of days out of the workplace to work from Little extra tip: Remember to stick to Your Company’s home or as a full-time freelancer, you should by now at IT Policy! least realize you need a VPN. Freelancers along with virtual assistants are not short of options from a spread Although you’re operating away from the workplace, of nice VPN subscription services, however, avoid if you’re accessing your organization’s network or the free ones since they have a tendency to be slow. platform provided by your company, you should make ( Not to mention sell your data, as always nothing is sure that you’re adhering to the IT policy. As you’ve in truly free in this life ) all probability already signed an agreement to try to do this.

It’s can be that the IT usage policy could exclude you from working from your favorite restaurant or remote working spot. Despite whether or not you’ve got a VPN running on your PC, this might be an enormous no-no, thus tread fastidiously. Contact your IT department for clarification.

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